


Volume 1: The Ashes of an Empire

by JoeBass3122



Series: The Architects [2]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Alien Technology, Body Horror, Far Future, Hard Sci Fi, Multiple Protagonists, Near Future, Obscure Movie References, Outer Space, Physics, Science Fiction, Solar System, Space Opera, Time Skips, Time Travel, scientist, weird space stuff
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-06
Updated: 2021-01-14
Packaged: 2021-03-02 21:22:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 25
Words: 42,403
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24033460
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JoeBass3122/pseuds/JoeBass3122
Summary: This work is preluded by The Illusion of Death, which can be found under this series list.Following the events of the prelude we meet brilliant Martian scientist Dr. Solaris Khorana on a research expedition. A massive cavern system recently unearthed by an earthquake brings into question many assumptions held about the development of life in the Solar System. At the deepest surveyed point of the site is a strange formation, referred to as the Henge, which upon close inspection appears to have been created intentionally - but by whom? The sudden and disastrous arrival of a stranger only adds to the mystery, what is his connection to the Henge?
Series: The Architects [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1672225





	1. Chapter 1 - Solaris

It was the discovery of the century, perhaps even the millennium. Hidden beneath the dusty and hazardous wastes of this planet was a massive subterranean system. Revealed by a chance earthquake that shattered the mass of rock that had kept it sealed for what her colleagues believed to be millions of years. There, at the site, was recently graduated Dr. Solaris Khorana, a biologist from the Martian capital city, First Landing.

As a biologist, there was work enough for many lifetimes. The caverns had teemed with life, an entire ecosystem had developed, split from the surface-dwelling life millions of years ago. There were libraries worth of dissertations to be written about the way that life had adapted and developed in these caves and how that impacted the modern-day understanding of more familiar life-forms. And unfortunately, most of it was dead.

The earthquake itself killed off much of the subterranean population, but what followed after was even more devastating. Exposed now to an environment much harsher than the protected and sealed caves’ environment, thousands of species died as their million-year old bubble collapsed. They left only their corpses behind. _It’s such a shame to have lost these fascinating creatures_ , Solaris felt, _but despite death, we can discover their stories_.

One of the more interesting aspects of the caverns were the massive stone monoliths. These monoliths were at first considered a natural, albeit strange, part of the geology but they were soon discovered to have been placed extremely evenly within several decimal points of accuracy measured centerpoint to centerpoint. Such accuracy could hardly be natural. Some theorized they had been placed or carved by something, or someone. The latter assumption was widely dismissed as wild conjecture, but it’s implications excited Solaris’ mind. It would completely up-end everything they understood about how life developed on this planet.

The first few monoliths found at the new collapsed entrance were dark and damaged by the earthquake. As explorers ventured further in, they found a trail of undamaged ones that were wrapped in some sort of vine-like organism which glowed faintly with a purplish light - just one of the many mysteries waiting to be unraveled.

At the deepest point of the cavern system, at least the deepest yet surveyed, was the Henge. Named for its similarity to the famed Stonehenge, it was a massive chamber filled with shallow water, around which was a ring of the strange monoliths. In the center of the lake was a small island, surveys showed it to be in the mathematical center of the circle. It’s central location, as well as the large amount of still-living flora and fauna in the chamber made it Solaris’ primary worksite.

Early in the mornings she would leave the little village the researchers had established by the cave entrance. It sat about a mile away, sometimes she’d catch a ride from a coworker in their ATV, other times when she was working on a problem or wanted to be left alone, she would hike the distance by foot. Ever since her new boss, Murphy, had arrived Solaris found herself walking to work more often. He wasn’t a terrible boss, but he was what one might call _intense_.

He wasn’t a scientist. He was a security contractor who had been given the post because the university didn’t have a very wide pool of experienced middle management to pull from. He had a military background and not a lot of patience for those who wasted his time, which in his book were most of those he worked with, and had set out on his first day to instill some discipline into the ranks of those he managed. _He’ll probably be transferred before long_ , Solaris felt sure, _some oligarch’s kid is going to make sure of it_. Still, she wasn’t going to be the one that complained – she had actually _earned_ her degree despite what some might claim.

The caverns this morning glistened in the pale sunlight that filtered through the noxious clouds. A light acid rain had fallen this morning, it had already weathered away at some of the surrounding limestone. The surface atmosphere on this planet – while technically breathable – was always full of corrosive dust and oxygen-poor. It was best to have a full EVA suit, but on a dry day just a respirator would work. Solaris’ university-provided EVA suit was probably older than her, constructed more of patches than actual suit, and still smelled of whatever cleaning solvent they soaked them with between assignments. Once she got down into the deeper parts of the cavern the air quality would be better, and she could go with just the respirator while she worked. Technically, the air down there was breathable, but there was always the concern of discovering a new pathogen that was more than ready to make the jump to humans after its million-year isolation.

At the entrance of the cavern was a monorail-type elevator that would take her the rest of the way down to the Henge. It made a few stops in between, and Solaris hoped she wouldn’t see Murphy at one of them. He had it out for her because he thought she was going to slack off like the rest of the scientists that shared her background. Her hopes were dashed as she drew near to the entrance station, Murphy was already standing there, clipboard in hand and an impatient expression on his face.

“Ah, Dr. Khorana, I was wondering when you’d eventually make your way to work. Had a nice long lie-in?” Murphy asked with mock interest.

“Actually, I spent all of last night reorganizing the sample collection because _someone_ insisted that was off-hours work”, Solaris smiled back at him. Murphy looked like he’d swallowed something sour, he had gotten onto his unit for doing what he called ‘office work’ instead of what he considered ‘lab work’. He seemed to have this ill-conceived notion that scientific work involved more laboratory exercises and ‘eureka’ moments than the mundane reality of it being mostly data entry and ‘that’s weird…’ moments. Solaris boarded the monorail and fought looking over her shoulder for Murphy. He may not be the most technically knowledgeable about the scientific process, but he was always watching for weaknesses to exploit for office politics.

The monorail hummed as it began to roll down the track, Solaris took her work tablet out to see what she needed to do at the Henge when she got there. There was data to be collected, sensors to check for calibration, samples to be collected… She had only just started reading when everything shuddered and the monorail halted. A quake. It had been like someone had reached down and shook the monorail like a tin can, causing its occupants to fall into one another with a steady stream of expletives darkening the air.

_What the hell?_

She pushed past her slowly recovering coworkers in order to look out the window, they were a little over halfway down to the Henge and the monorail’s emergency power lights flashed. Solaris disengaged the door lock, she had to get down to the Henge to check on the equipment down there. There were a lot of delicate sensors and machines recording the environmental conditions that would need to be reset after the jolt that had just happened. Sure, she probably should have waited for everything to settle, but in the moment the thought of dealing with an increasingly longer gap in the data felt more inconvenient than rockslides. She grabbed an extra respirator on the way out, it was possible one of her co-workers already down there had theirs damaged in the quake.

She ran down the caverns towards the Henge. As she approached it, she noticed that the normally glowing vines on the monoliths had gone dark. Maybe the quake had damaged them and that was their reaction to trauma. But as she drew nearer to the bottleneck that lead to the Henge she saw light streaming through the opening, a purplish light. She slowed, then ducked through the entrance to find the Henge transformed.

Instead of the ordinarily darker cavern, the room was bathed in a purple glow from the twelve monoliths arranged around the lake and its island. The vines seemed to have spread, and covered the faces of the monoliths, and some sort of glowing spore floated in the stagnant air. It gave the cavern an otherworldly appearance. There were also vine growths that grew into the lake and emerged on the shore of the small island where a dark shape could be seen surrounded by the vines. That was new.

Curiosity piqued; Solaris waded through the shallow pool being careful not to trip on the mass of vines that now grew beneath the water. She couldn’t tell what was in the center island until she was on it, and the vines receded as if in response to her presence. She gasped. What lay in the middle of the island was a person.

The man lay curled on the ground, he was tall, thin, and pale – the perfect stereotype of a spacewalker, someone who’d grown up or spent most of their lives in less than a quarter G. He was wearing a very old flight suit that was stained with blood. The man wasn’t breathing, or maybe he was just very still. Solaris knelt down next to him, even with a closer view, she still couldn’t tell if he was dead or not. Behind her she could hear footsteps, then Murphy called out from the other side of the water.

“Dr. Khorana, what’s going on?!” he said as he crossed the water.

Solaris turned to answer but her attention was caught by something else. The man had moved!

He rolled onto his back, gasping in the hostile atmosphere. His face was gaunt and he stared at Solaris with an expression of absolute terror and pleading. Solaris grabbed her spare respirator and fitted it over the man’s face and his breathing settled into a more normal rhythm. Something about his face and his expression reminded her of something she’d seen a long time ago. He looked like he was going to say something to her, then Murphy caught up to them and the man’s eyes went wide with panic.

“Dr. Khorana, get out of the way”, he said coldly, in his hand was the taser he always carried with him. He always seemed excited to have a chance to use it, luckily the university only allowed ‘non-lethals’ to be carried on their properties. That was the current policy, at least. She’d heard rumors that the restrictions were being lifted.

“This man obviously needs medical attention, we need to get him back to the camp”, Solaris told him. The strange man still sat frozen, staring at Murphy and his taser with the same expression a cornered animal might have.

“Get out of the way”, Murphy repeated his voice icy, then his face changed to warmer expression, “Please, so I can help him get back to the camp”. His tone had become friendlier, placating.

Hearing Murphy sound almost personable for once was so unnatural that Solaris paused for a moment, then stood up, “How can I he-“. Murphy tased the strange man in the chest and he crumpled to the ground.

“Wha- What did you do that for?!” Solaris yelled at him.

“If you have a problem with how I handled this, you can write it up in the incident report. Until then, we both have our own jobs to do”, Murphy waved her off dismissively and opened up his radio to his security team.

There was nothing else that she could do, so Solaris trekked back up to the cavern entrance alone. Murphy’s dismissal of her was yet another straw on the camel’s back, and she considered yet again the idea of going back home. But that would mean her parents were right, so she stayed on the path to her housing unit and then tried to lose herself in her notes, but the strange man kept turning up in her thoughts.

The questions his existence posed seemed much more interesting than the months’ worth of data she needed to enter into the system before tomorrow. Questions like, who was the strange man? Where did he come from and how did he get into the cave without being noticed? Perhaps there were passageways beyond the mapped areas that lead to alternative entrances. Solaris made note of it. She could talk to the survey team tomorrow and see if they’d found anything like that.


	2. Chapter 1 - Sirius

To say that Sirius was surprised to be alive would be an understatement. His last memory had been the flash of light, after which he was sure he had died. That was after all, when his consciousness had ceased only to kick back up again in a strange place that was _vastly_ different from where he’d last been. It had been surprising that there was somebody already there when he woke up. A woman had been there, her face was mostly obscured by her EVA suit. She had tried to help him, he remembered, until a stocky and serious looking man had tased him. His name was Martin? Murtry? No, Murphy.

After being tased they’d dragged him up to some sort of administration building and tossed in a holding cell. Then he was essentially ignored, which was fine by him. Sirius could use the isolation and quiet to plan his way out. But even worse than waking up somewhere different was waking up different. His body had been changed.

The most obvious change, aside from being completely healed from his ordeal with the bioweapon, was that he had both arms now. While his left arm had originally terminated above the elbow, now it was a full flesh-and-blood limb as if he’d never lost it in the first place. _Perhaps I should be happier about this,_ Sirius thought, _it’s not every day you grow an entire arm back_. Still, he felt extremely disconcerted by the new arm, Sirius supposed he had gotten used to it not being there and while it was a part of him, it felt strange, like it didn’t quite belong to him. Every time Sirius saw it out of the corner of his eye, he reflexively flinched until he realized it was his own arm attached to his own body. It was irrational, but it was like he didn’t trust this new arm.

A number of other smaller ills had been corrected as well, his eyesight had become better and that stupid tattoo he’d gotten as a kid had disappeared. Altogether, these changes left Sirius more uncomfortable than happy. Maybe because so much of his identity had been a product of what he’d had before and the changes felt like somebody had taken his life and forcibly pushed it into line with some sort of idealized version of him. He felt violated, and not just from his experience on the strange space station.

Over all of this was the familiar sensation of being held down by a gravity that was too strong for comfort. An oppressive inescapable weight, like a massive invisible hand pressing him into the floor which made his joints pop and grind uncomfortably as he walked. He felt nauseated and sick, but even then, it felt better than whatever that virus had done to him. The force of gravity felt similar to the near full-G of the station he had been on, and Sirius assumed that was why he wasn’t suffering from its effects more severely. He must have adapted to it somewhat during his time imprisoned on the station which made his adjustment to the gravity of this planet all the easier.

Still, despite the relatively mild case of gravity sickness Sirius was experiencing, he wished he had the freedom of a lower gravity. He paced the perimeter of the cell, then kicked at one of the walls in frustration. He felt annoyed at how much that brief physical exercise took out of him, so he settled for sitting on the cell’s cot. Sirius felt trapped. He spent a few hours alone before he felt another presence in the room, and he recognized it before he even looked up– Dima.

The big man was leaning against the wall looking very comfortable for the recently diseased. He nodded at Sirius when he noticed him staring.

“So, are you real?” Sirius asked cautiously – his voice was a little ragged and he realized his throat was dry – he’d kill for a bit of water right now.

Dima shrugged, “Does it matter?” He seemed awfully nonchalant about everything. His disproportionate calm was unsettling – was _any_ of this real? Was this some sort of weird hallucination or dream? Given his recent experiences, Sirius felt a thorough break with reality was definitely warranted. And what was Dima doing here? What did he want?

As Sirius considered that, the big man’s expression was hard to read, “So, uhh, Dima. You’re not mad at me, are you? I let you die; I should have done something, I- “

Dima cut him off with his hand, “Sirius, listen, it wasn’t your fault, in fact it’s a very good thing you were the one to find the artefact, because I need you to do something for me”.

“Yeah, sure, what do you need- wait, how did you know about the artefact? You weren’t there when whatever the fuck _it_ was that happened, so you’re not the real Dima, are you?”, Sirius asked, a note of fear could be heard in his voice. He was starting to lose it. His grip on reality was tenuous. He wondered if anything mattered now.

The thing that looked like Dima smiled and laughed, “Look, you’ve got me, I’m not the real Dima – he’s dead but you knew that already. I’m just a construct – I can look like anybody that you’ve seen before”.

“Why do you look like Dima, then? Who _are_ you really?” Sirius could feel himself growing angry, “Don’t you think it’s kinda sick to wear the face of a dead man? I watched him _die_ ”.

“My name is Orion, I’m…not exactly…human. I chose this form because it was the last person you remembered fondly, and I thought it might be more comforting to you if we met first like this. If this is too disturbing for you, I can change”, the figure offered.

Sirius considered it for a minute, _did_ he feel disturbed? Or did he just feel like he _should_ be disturbed? He wasn’t sure, it wasn’t like he had much experiences with things wearing a dead friend’s face. Then he shrugged, “Fuck. I think I’m going crazy. To be honest, I can’t think of a friendlier face, anybody else would make whatever the fuck _this_ is worse.”

“You’re saying that about a guy who was ready and willing to beat you then throw you out an airlock? Your social circles must be severely lacking” Orion-wearing-Dima commented.

“You got that one right”, Sirius replied, “So, how is it that I can see you? Why am I alive right now?” He had a million other questions, but those two were the first that he could find words for.

“First, what you see as Dima, or me, is just a projection, not actually real. I’m using your memories to simulate this image of your friend, which is why I had to pick someone you knew. I’m just sending the right impulses to the right parts of your brain so that in your experience, you’re seeing somebody in the room with you. I thought having a conversational partner might make things more comfortable for you as I understand your species is quite socially focused. Secondly, you’re alive because I need you to be. I don’t have a physical body, and I needed one to help me get off that rock. You were the first viable option”.

Sirius turned pale and he felt his skin crawl, “Wait, so you’re _in_ my body?! What the fuck?! How do I get you out?”

“I cannot exist here without a proper storage medium, which is where you come in. In order to leave I’d need to find another suitable location or go home. I have a home somewhere but until we get what I need, I can’t go back”.

“But how does that work? You still haven’t answered my question exactly”.

“Think of the human brain like a computer with all those connections powered by electrical impulses that in a specific configuration make up a Self, like that which you consider ‘You’. What you consider ‘me’ is just another collection of data which was downloaded when you touched the artefact. Your brain is like a storage device for the data that my Self is comprised of. All I am is a collection of data and you’re the drive to which I’m stored”.

“What?”, Sirius understood on a basic level what Orion was telling him, but his explanation only answered a few of the questions he had. “But, if you’re just data, how were you able to get us here?”

“The rock I was trapped in was a part of a network of cables for one of our relay gates. I was in the process of transmitting out when the Gate shut down unexpectedly and most of that which was ‘me’ as well as some of the energy flowing through that system got trapped in that segment of cable. When you released me, you also released the energy which annihilated everything in that room. Unfortunately, that included what you might call the ‘original’ you”.

“That doesn’t answer how I’m here _now_ ”, Sirius said, he was starting to get a headache just thinking about what Orion was saying. As he thought about it, he realized that mentally he could feel something. A sort of presence that sat in the back of his mind which if he focused on it felt otherworldly and…powerful. That had to be Orion.

“You’re here now because I used some of that gate energy to transmit our ‘Selves’ here, the process had already started, I just needed to choose a destination. I reconstructed your physical aspect according to the data that I had on your species. That meant any physical abnormalities that you may have had prior were lost, which I am only now learning might be distressing. That was not my intent. Unfortunately, I’m unable to leave now that I’m here, unless I find another suitable host”, Orion explained.

“So, how do we do that? How can I get rid of you faster?” Sirius asked.

“It’s an odd thing. I don’t remember what happened before I was trapped on that rock. But this gate was the last place I remember so we _need_ to go back there, for a start”, Orion insisted, it seemed like he was begging, even.

Sirius laughed at the thought of some possibly ancient, definitely formless being begging _him_ for anything, it was absurd and he still wasn’t sure if this was reality or not, “In case you haven’t noticed, we’re not exactly in a position to be going wherever the hell we want, and even if we did get out, what makes you think that _I_ want to go back there? You can talk all you want, but it seems that _I’m_ still the one in the pilot’s seat and _you’re_ just a passenger”.

Orion nodded, “You’re right, it would be rude of me to force you to go anywhere but perhaps we could cut a deal? Your species seems to thrive on trade, and with what I remember and will remember, I’m sure I could provide something you’d want. What is it that you want?”

Sirius thought for a while, right now, he’d settle for getting out of this cage and gravity well. “Get me off this fuckin’ planet and we’ll take it from there”.

“In comparison to your initial distress that’s fairly permissive, are you sure?” Orion asked.

“It’s the best thing I can come up with based on what I know so far”, Sirius agreed, “now, can you tell me where in the universe we are?”


	3. Chapter 1 - Rodion

The city of the future had always been portrayed as a city of modern geometric shapes with flashes of clean white and bright color. The Muscovite reality was far different. The brutalist apartment blocks had only become bigger, taller, and more oppressive. Rodion Nikolaevich Safronov lived on the 42nd floor of one of the massive towers that broke through the dense smog and he was late for a meeting with his brother, Georgi Nikolaevich.

At least the metro had been expanded, one could reach any point in the city in good time provided they weren’t afraid of the metro’s patrons. The only people who rode on the metro were long-time city residents – tourists tended to order their own cabs. It was only apocryphal, but Rodion had heard a story about an old country grandmother who had brought a brace of chickens into the metro, proceeded to butcher them, then cooked them on a portable stove before disembarking. Those birds had boarded alive and left as chicken Kiev. The would-be chef had considered everything aside from the clean-up and it had been half a day before the car had been pulled off the line for cleaning.

Today at least, no chickens were being slaughtered on the Metro. It was just crowded, just like always. Rodion shouldered his way through the crowd and picked a spot to stand where he wouldn’t have to fight with as many people to get out. His brother lived with their mother two stops down. Vika Alekseevna Safronov was getting on in her years and the brothers had agreed to take a percentage off their checks to finance for her retirement somewhere in the lower gravities of Mars or Luna where her old bones could finally get some rest. He put up with the crowd for the duration of his trip, and felt relieved when he finally was able to disembark into the slightly less crowded metro station.

Georgi lived on the slightly more desirable 28th floor of his housing block and answered quickly when Rodion rang the bell, he looked irritated.

“You got here late; I have to take Alisa to her mother’s. We’ll talk after I take her”, he said ushering Rodion inside the tiny apartment.

“How’s mama?” Rodion asked as he hung up his coat in the entryway.

“You know how she is, complaining about the neighbors being Chinese again. You’d think all things considered she would be a bit more open-minded”, Georgi replied.

“Are you talking about Baba? Hi, Uncle Rodya!” Alisa came in, she was 8 years old as of last May, a cute girl and really smart for her age, “By the way, Baba told me to tell you she’s got tea on”. Alisa had her backpack and suitcase packed already; she was used to the now bi-weekly custody agreement.

Rodion nodded, “Thanks Alisa, tell your mom I said hello and thanks for the piroschki she sent last week. They were great!”. They’d been the only thing he’d eaten some days. His paycheck had been short that week.

“I will, Mama’s piroschki are the best!” Alisa agreed.

“You’re right, no one makes them better. Maybe you can ask her to show you how to make them while you’re there and then you can teach us the recipe! It’s time to go”, Georgi took Alisa’s suitcase.

“Bye Uncle Rodya!” Alisa waved, and the two left the apartment.

Standing alone in the entryway, Rodion decided to see what his mother would complain about today, get it out of the way early, so he headed into the tiny kitchen. At the small table sat the older woman, cradling a cup of strong black tea in one hand and in front of her sat a small plate of tea biscuits. Rodion took his time preparing some tea from the family samovar, an heirloom from the old days, then sat across from her. She smiled at him and gestured at the plate of cookies. She wouldn’t accept a no in reply, so even though Rodion had stopped enjoying that particular sort of cookie several years ago, he took a few and piled them next to his cup. He found that if he returned them slowly to the plate when she wasn’t looking, she wouldn’t notice that he hadn’t eaten them.

“Hi Mama, Georgi told me you’ve been keeping him busy talking about the neighbors again”, he started cautiously, he knew the topic could lead to some less-than-enjoyable conversation. Vika was generally a nice woman but she had been introduced to some concerning ‘news’ sites by one of her co-workers at the hospital she worked part-time at. They had only encouraged her to be more confident in her prejudices.

“They’re up to something, I know it”, Vika replied, “Just yesterday they-.

“Look, mom, just because they’re from another country doesn’t mean they’re plotting something”, Rodion cut in.

“They don’t even speak Russian! They’re always talking in their language around me, makes me suspect they’re up to something”, Vika said unsatisfied with Rodion’s attempt to placate her, “And you remember – “

“Mom. Don’t start this again”, Rodion warned, she was venturing into dangerous territory.

“No. I will start this. Remember what happened to your father in the war? They killed him!” Vika started to tear up. They had never got to have a funeral only a brief missive from his command from the front informing them that he was dead and that as a result they were entitled to a small payout from his future salary. Rodion had been 5 and Georgi had been 8, the same age Alisa was now. To lose a father at that age had been devastating and Rodion had sworn to never let his future children, or nieces, experience such a thing in their lives as long as he could help it. It had been terrible, yes, but this was taking things too far.

“Mom, what happened to dad was terrible, but the war’s over now. And these people had nothing to do with it. Let’s just try to be nice to them, they might move out anyways, one of the new housing blocks opened up a few days ago, close to the schools and the shopping. Lots of people from this part of town have been applying”, he excused, hoping that it would get her to accept the circumstances long enough for Georgi and him to get her enrolled in an eldercare off-planet where the staff were better trained to handle these kinds of outbursts.

Vika still looked upset, but she had calmed down enough for Rodion to feel like she would drop the matter, for now. The two sat in silence, sipping their tea. Vika finally broke the silence.

“I’m making some buterbrod”, was all she said then got up and busied herself with getting the ingredients. Rodion felt that she wanted to be alone, she was always like that when the conversation came around to their father. Rodion had to remember that she had been young too, when she’d lost her husband. She too, had expected a lifetime of memories with the man she loved and had had her hopes dashed all too soon. Rodion left the kitchen and decided to have a walk around the living room of Georgi’s apartment, waiting for him to return from Alisa’s mother’s place.

Georgi had done some redecorating since Rodion had last visited. He took that as a good sign, a sign that things between Georgi and his husband, Dmitri were going better. Dmitri had always struggled with living planetside. It made sense. Given his background, Dmitri’s job opportunities planetside were minimal so he spent most of his time shipping out on long-haul trips. Dmitri’s reasoning had been the money, which was good, but Rodion guessed it also gave him an excuse to stay off-planet for just a little while longer. But if Georgi had taken the time to redecorate – a new sofa, extra chairs for the dining table, there was even an extra desk tucked away in a corner – that had to mean the Dmitri was coming down for good. He was glad that Georgi and Alisa would have their family all together.

He heard the front door unlock, and his brother came in.

“I like the new couch”, Rodion told him.

“That old thing? I got it from the family across the hall”, Georgi’s tone was dismissive but his face showed he was pleased.

“Has the spaceman finally decided to come home?” Rodion joked.

Georgi’s face fell, “Actually, that’s what I wanted to talk to you about”, he sat on the couch, and rested his head in his hands.

Rodion sat down nearby, he hadn’t expected this, “What happened? Are you two having problems? Again?”

His brother stayed silent for a moment, “I thought we were making progress with the whole living together thing. In our last call all he could talk about was how he was excited to come see us once his tour was over. That was 2 weeks ago, and I haven’t heard from him since. We were supposed to talk three days ago, but my calls kept falling through. He should’ve at least sent us a message by now. He knows how I worry”.

“Do you think something happened to him?”, Rodion asked.

“I _have_ to think that. I thought we had got past the ghosting stage a long time ago, but I don’t know. Maybe I don’t know him as well as I’d thought. God, I hope not, I really love him”.

Vika came in, she had finished preparing the buterbrod and placed the tray in front of the two, then sat in the armchair and started to sew, while listening to the conversation. Rodion wasn’t sure what her thoughts on the matter were, she’d never really indicated feeling one way or another about her son-in-law.

“Have you told Alisa yet?” Rodion asked.

“Oh, no. I don’t want her to be more worried than she is already. And we still don’t know what’s going on yet, which is why I asked you to come. I remember during your mandatory service you used to work on auditing down at the shipyards. Maybe you know somebody who can look up the ship Dmitri was on and see what’s going on with it, please? When I sent in an info request, they said it would take almost half a year for it to process because it’s a Mars ship”.

“Georgi, you know I’d do anything for you and your family. Of course, I’ll look around for you. Can you tell me the name of the ship he was shipping out on?”

“It was the _Anna Karenina_ , shipped out from Deimos Prime almost two years ago”, Georgi told him. 


	4. Chapter 2 - Solaris

Her unit’s alarm went off, chiming softly, it was morning. Solaris awoke to find herself still seated at her desk where she had been that night working on entering her data into the catalogue. From what the screen said, she had gotten to ‘S’ before she had dozed off, but she hardly remembered dozing off. The air conditioning unit in her hab was busted and she peeled herself off the desk’s plastic surface, the rain from yesterday had made the air very humid. She needed a shower.

The water was cold and the pressure nonexistent and after an all-too-short and disappointing shower, Solaris changed into some fresh clothes and tied her long black hair up and out of the way. Her mother would have had a heart attack if she ever dared to cut it, so she settled for keeping it tied up constantly which had the desired effect of being both practical and annoying the old lady to no end. Her mother was insistent upon marrying off all of her many daughters to other sons of rich men and had succeeded up until it was Solaris’ turn. Solaris had no interest in dating, especially not from the pool of men her mother approved of. Eventually, she might get around to it, but for now science was her main focus. She would happily spend the rest of her life in this humid, cramped, slightly smelly housing unit if it meant that she could keep doing research.

The weather report showed a minimal chance of acid rain, so Solaris elected to take just the respirator for her walk to the mess hall for breakfast, it wouldn’t be far anyways. She was so focused on what she was planning to get for breakfast that she didn’t notice Murphy walk up beside her and address her until he grabbed her elbow. She jumped, her morning now shattered by his sudden and unwelcome appearance.

“I _said_ , Dr. Khorana, that you still need to fill out the incident report from yesterday, remember?”, Murphy reminded her, not-so-gently.

“Oh. Yes. The report. I’ll fill it out after breakfast”, she made a move towards the mess hall’s door, she was _so_ close to escaping his grasp.

“I’m afraid not, HQ’s asked that we resolve this matter quickly, so if you really can’t wait for breakfast, I suggest you pick something up and then meet me at my office”, Murphy released her arm. Solaris took his comment about waiting for breakfast as a challenge, which given his usual inclinations, it probably was. So, she just shrugged in response.

“No, it’s fine, I’ll grab something after”, Solaris added that to the running total of grievances she had against him, a small one but it helped her vent and kept her from snapping at the man too much. She had opened up some server space in the Biology Lab where people could post what the latest Murphy-ism was. It was by far the most popular page in camp with nearly hourly updates. It was juvenile and completely unprofessional, sure, but it kept morale up.

She followed Murphy to the administrative sector of the research village, he had an office in one of the bigger prefabbed buildings. His office shared space with the security admin with whom he seemed to be getting along swimmingly. At this point he might as well run both buildings.

“So, that guy we found, what’s going to happen with him?”, Solaris asked as they passed into Murphy’s office.

“Does it really matter? Don’t you have important science to focus on? You know, ‘discovery of the century’ and all?” Murphy asked, then sitting down, he shrugged, “Since the university’s a Martian legal entity they’re sending Martian police to come pick him up and bring him back to Mars where they’ll figure out who he is and put him in the can for a few years for trespassing on an active research site. The sooner you finish the incident report, the sooner he can get going to where he needs to be – out of my hair. Now, here’s the paperwork – get to writing”. Murphy offered her a clipboard with a large stack of paper, it was surprising how little bureaucracy had changed.

She accepted the clipboard and began to fill out the various forms that needed to be filled out before she could write her written statement, then she’d need to affirm that her statement was true, then she’d need to prove that she was of sound mind writing the statement, then she’d need to prove that she really was Dr. Solaris Khorana, etc., etc.

Murphy spent the time sitting at his desk, sometimes engaged with his computer, sometimes on a call with various people that he usually swore at. Solaris felt like a fly on the wall of someone whose personal life she wasn’t supposed to be seeing and she hoped that the man would find a reason for one or both of them to leave. Her hopes were answered when one of the security contractors poked his head into the small office, “Hey, Murphy, one of your docs – Dr. Simmons from genetics – needs to be pulled in for a drunk and disorderly. Might be good for you to be there when it goes down”.

Murphy muttered an expletive then grabbed his respirator and gestured to Solaris, “I can’t leave you in my office alone, not that I don’t trust you – it’s just university policy. Please, follow this man here to one of our spare workrooms where you can finish the paperwork in peace, then you can leave”.

Solaris gathered up the many sheets of paper and followed the security contractor to the aforementioned room who then explained, “Bathrooms are right as you exit, on the left is a vending machine. Everything past that door at the end of the hall is off-limits – don’t be going for any long walks without one of us”. Then he left. Solaris returned to filling out the forms. It was absolutely mind-numbing. If there was a hell, it was full of bureaucrats and mountains of forms.

The hallway they had put her in was quiet, she counted maybe once or twice a set of footsteps travelling down it in the past half hour. She thought about the strange man and wondered how he’d gotten to the Henge without a respirator. Why did the vines behave so oddly around him? Why had there been another earthquake? He was obviously a spacewalker, someone who had spent more of their life in artificial gravity than on a real planet, so why was he here? It took months of preparation and planning for a Spacewalker to adjust their bodies to better handle planetary gravities so that ruled out any sudden, unplanned trips. And, thanks to Murphy, she’d never get answers.

Or would she?

Solaris knew that the security office must keep their holding cells pretty close by, and she knew that behind the door at the end of the hall was ‘off-limits’. She also knew that almost no one would be walking down the hall _and_ Dr. Simmons would probably need the whole security team to wrangle him in his inebriation, so now was precisely the right time to go poking around where she shouldn’t to talk to people that she wasn’t supposed to talk to. In ten minutes, she could be back in this room, and no one would be wiser.

She left the papers on the desk and cautiously peeked out into the hall. No one was there. Walking as quietly as she could manage, she arrived at the ‘forbidden’ door. It had no lock, which made sense, the university was only expecting the odd drunk or two when they designed their security offices. She listened at the door for sounds of people on the other side, but it was silent, so she pushed it open and snuck through. She had been right, this door lead to the holding cells. They were all empty, excepting the last one in which sat the strange man. His expression was thoughtful and somewhat sad and upon seeing Solaris he simply asked one question, “This really is Earth, isn’t it?”

“Yes”, Solaris answered, “this is Earth”.


	5. Chapter 2 - Sirius

“Hi, I’m Dr. Khorana”, the woman introduced herself. She was a short woman – stocky like a planetsider, with long black hair tied back in a tight bun, dark skin, and an anxious smile. She wasn’t very old, mid-twenties at latest and she had a roundish face. She grabbed a chair and sat across from the cell door – looking a little nervous but the way she looked at him was focused, studying him. Sirius sat up a bit straighter in response to the probing gaze and hugged his knees to his chest. It made him feel safer.

Orion had disappeared from sight when the woman came in, but he could feel the alien consciousness flitting about in the back of his head – it made him slightly nauseous if he paid too much attention to it. _Occupying two minds will do that to you_ , a voice that Sirius recognized as Orion’s commented, _just try to tune it out – you’ll get used to it eventually, it’s not comfortable for me, either_.

Sirius watched her and waited for her to explain what she wanted from him. He’d learned it was best not to volunteer too much information to people he didn’t know, and she was a scientist – of what, he didn’t know. Maybe she was a part of what had got him sent here, somehow tracked him down and was going to finish the job. She didn’t _look_ evil, but evil often wore a trustworthy-looking face. _She’s not one of Them,_ Orion commented, _I’d recognize her_. Sirius nodded, only realizing he’d done it physically when Dr. Khorana looked at him curiously.

After a short pause, she continued, “What’s your name?” She smiled anxiously and Sirius noticed that she often looked towards the door of the holding cell block. _She’s not supposed to be here_ , he guessed. Most prison doctors, in his experience, were too overworked to give a shit about bedside manner and tended not to scare easy and Dr. Khorana looked almost terrified to be caught here.

“Sirius”, he told her. It wouldn’t hurt to give his name. Sure, it was less common than ‘Ivan’, but the odds of them deciding which ‘Sirius’ he was were comfortably low.

“Hm. Sirius”, she seemed to turn it over in her head, “do you have a last name?”

“No”, he said. She looked somewhat taken aback by his bluntness.

“What were you doing there?” she asked. Sirius shot her a questioning look and, noting his confusion, she clarified, “At the Henge?”

“What’s the Henge?”, Sirius asked, maybe he could bore her or waste her time with dumb questions. He was good at dumb questions.

“The place we found you – you know with the monoliths and the lake?” She explained. _The Relay Gate,_ Orion added.

Sirius didn’t know how to answer that. The truth was out of the question, but he had no plausible lie ready to go off of. He had hoped to have more time to observe his surroundings and come up with something but if this was what Earth looked like now, he’d have none of the context needed to lie believably if everything else had changed half as much. She looked like she wouldn’t leave without an answer – she seemed too smart for non-answers, so what could he tell her? He decided to go with a blend of truth and fiction, “I don’t know, I just woke up there. I don’t remember what happened”.

“So, you don’t remember anything?” The woman didn’t look like she’d bought it, “You didn’t have an EVA suit or a respirator – getting all the way down there without them would’ve been almost impossible… Where do you remember being last?” Dr. Khorana asked.

 _She’s asking too many questions_ , Orion said, _we need to find a way to deflect this line of questioning_.

“But how?” Sirius said aloud before he could stop himself. Damn, it was hard to adjust to his new guest.

“What do you mean by that, Sirius?”, Dr. Khorana asked. This lady was way too curious. She was studying him again, and he wondered briefly what it was that she saw when she looked at him. He felt like some sort of specimen under a magnifying glass – he needed to break this tension.

Sirius stood up and his knees popped noisily under the heavy gravity. He began to assess the cell door. He hadn’t heard of the door manufacturer before, but manufacturing contracts were like hot potatoes – always being passed around, and the design looked familiar enough. It was made of some sort of composite, some clear and some painted to look like metal and the door lock was intentionally large – all the hallmarks of a cheaply manufactured cell door that was supposed to look intimidating for the infrequently jailed. He may not have seen the exact configuration of this door, but he had a good guess as to how it was supposed to work. Subconsciously, he put his hands in his pockets while he considered the problem and in one of his pockets, he felt something cold and metal. It was the sliver of metal he and Dima had used to crack open the medical room, a long time ago.

“Hey, did you hear me?” Dr. Khorana prompted and Sirius remembered she had asked him something. With the metal piece acting as a lever, he could pop the door quickly, just needed to distract her.

“Yeah, I heard you”, Sirius responded, “Hey, who’s that?!” he said turning and pointing down the hall.

Dr. Khorana turned in panic, “What?! Where?” She walked down the hall cautiously.

Sirius took this opportunity to pry the lock’s casing open using the metal piece. It took a few noisy yanks, but it came off relatively easily. Inside was the lock mechanism and there was the solution. The bolt was held in place by a few flimsy plastic pieces which he bent until they allowed enough play on the bolt for him to slide it back, which it did with an audible click and the door opened slightly. Bingo.

“Hey! What are you doing?!” the scientist asked, she had returned from checking on his false alarm and seeing the door open stopped her short. She seemed a lot more anxious now that there wasn’t a glass panel between them.

“Getting the hell out of here, the fuck’s it look like?” Sirius replied. He stepped out of the cell and Dr. Khorana stepped in front of him.

“You didn’t answer my questions! The Henge reacted to you and I want to know why!”

“You’re a real scientist, huh?” Sirius asked her, “I’m busting outta here and you’re more concerned about answering your questions than your safety. Do the smart thing, get out of my way, or I’ll _make_ you get out of it”, he drew nearer to her using his height as an intimidation tactic – he was nearly a full head or so taller than her. He brandished the metal piece; the edge had been sharpened while he was using it to scrape drawings into his previous cells wall. He was getting really tired of people trying to keep him locked up.

The cell block door opened and the man who had tazed him came in with another man draped over his shoulder who was clearly passed out.

“Murphy, help! He’s escaping – I don’t know how but he broke the door!”, Dr. Khorana yelled to him and he dropped his charge, utterly surprised at the situation he had walked into. His surprise didn’t last long.

 _Time for more drastic action_ , Orion said, _I’m sure you know what to do_.

“Change of plans, doc”, Sirius said and grabbed her before she could bolt to safety, placing his makeshift shiv at her throat, “Shame, you seemed nice”.

“Th-thanks?” she stammered out.

“Okay, Marv – Murtry - Mark, this is how it’s going to be!” he shouted down the corridor.

“It’s Murphy!”, the man shouted indignantly, “And you don’t get to tell me how things are going to be!” He pulled his weapon, a real gun this time, “Let the Doctor go and get back in the cell! I will shoot!”

“It’s her life, Mikhail!” Sirius shouted at him – he really didn’t give a shit what the man called himself, “One wrong move and I’ll kill her right now!” His hostage was surprisingly calm for someone being held at both shiv-point and gun-point.

“We don’t have to do this”, she whispered.

“That’s all up to what _he_ does next, it’s nothing personal doc”, Sirius said. Then he shouted to Murphy, “You want her back alive; you listen very carefully what I say next, understand Margaret?” Now he was kind of having fun watching how angry the man got every time he messed up his name.

“Again, it’s fucking Murphy, fuck you”, Murphy swore, “What the fuck do you want?”

 _Don’t forget, we need to check out the Relay Gate_ , Orion reminded him. There were way too many people in this equation who just were not reacting properly. _Fine_ , Sirius thought at Orion.

“Ok, Fuckingmurphy, I’ll need your firearm, then I need two respirators- “

“Two respirators?” Murphy asked.

“Yeah, the doc will be coming with me as insurance. I have some business down at the Henge and I gotta make sure you don’t do anything stupid to the both of us while we’re down there. After I’m done, I’ll let her go and you’ll never see me again, understood?”

Murphy looked sour but he complied, “Understood”, he turned to leave.

“Wait a minute there, Marie”, Sirius commanded.

“ _What_ is it?” Murphy hissed.

“I want a bottle of water too”, Sirius smiled, “Oh, and one for the doc too”.


	6. Chapter 2 - Rodion

Rodion spent just enough time at his brother’s place to get all the info he needed. He asked where the _Anna Karenina_ shipped out of, when it had left, and what company it shipped out under. Georgi tried to answer as best he could, but like hundreds of ships that went through Deimos, a lot of the details were hidden from the general public under layers and layers of subterfuge. It made sense. Deimos had a very long history of housing some of the largest organized crime groups, the biggest of which: The Red Sky Faction, basically ran the station in everything but name. The fact that Deimos was a Martian territory only made things even more difficult. Mars shared only the barest minimum of information needed to keep Earth-Mars relations from becoming actively hostile. Everything else would be locked down behind layers and layers of bureaucrats and literal red tape. It would be like trying to pick a piece of hay out of a needlestack without getting stabbed.

He returned home before it became too late. His apartment was much smaller than Georgi’s, divided only into three rooms: a bedroom, a living room and kitchen combo, and a small bathroom. He also had a small balcony on which a row of sickly plants struggled to survive. The view from the balcony looked into a small, grey courtyard in which bands of children played soccer and the elderly sat to get some of the pale sun before it disappeared. He went outside and smoked a cigarette before he decided to get to work on his problem.

At his computer, he looked up his list of contacts that might be able to help cut some of the red tape surrounding the ship _Anna Karenina_. For this evening, a good start would be to write a few messages and see what kind of information he’d be able to turn up for the morning. Satisfied that he had made a good start in his inquiry, he decided to call it an evening and retired to the living room where he tuned his tv onto a channel that was showing some re-runs of an old comedy show. But instead of watching it, he let himself sink into thought, turning over what might be going on with Dmitri.

The _Anna_ was labelled as a refitted colony ship, which meant she was about 70 years old or so. Ships that old were guaranteed to break down as years of shitty welds and cheap materials degraded. Maybe the ship’s comms had been damaged. That would be the best-case scenario. Rodion had never spent any time in space, he’d performed too poorly on the tests they had been given during his time in the service, but he knew that long-haul tours tended to have lots and lots of problems which made accurately scheduling things like calls and meetings quite difficult.

Despite this, there was also the distinct possibility that things had taken a turn for the worse. If the state news was to be believed, there had been a recent uptick in mutinies and violent attacks on the stations and ships between Earth and Mars. Rodion remembered when it had all ‘started’. A group of young would-be revolutionaries had launched an attack on one of the orbital reflector arrays that protected Mars from the full brunt of solar radiation. The attack had failed spectacularly, to the luck of those living under the array, but it seemed to Rodion that ever since, there had been more and more attacks. Perhaps the _Anna Karenina_ had gotten caught up in one of those. It was worth looking into.

The next morning, Rodion found that he’d received answers to a few of the messages he’d sent the night before. Most were unhelpful, but as he was getting ready to leave for work, a message popped up from a certain Captain Anna L. Killian. She’d been in his basic training class during his service and they’d even served at the same post together for a while. They’d been pretty close once.

CAPT. KILLIAN: Got your message, can you take an early off? Might have some info for you.

RODION S: Sure, dinner? Usual place?

CAPT. KILLIAN: I’ll be there, 1900.

Once he’d gotten that taken care of, Rodion headed into work. After his discharge from the service Rodion had taken a job as a security guard in a contracting firm. He was currently assigned to do the rounds at a massive server farm closer to the city center. He checked in with his supervisor on his way in and inquired about clocking out early.

“Why not? You’ve had excellent attendance so far”, the man had shrugged then smiled conspiratorially, “Let me guess, meeting a girl?”

“I am, but I don’t think it’ll be the type of meeting you think it’ll be”, Rodion had answered but the man laughed dubiously then returned to his work.

Rodion changed into his work uniform and began his walk around the building. It was three massive stories of server banks. Since Rodion was just a guard, he didn’t get to know what was on the servers but one of his coworkers was of the opinion that there was some ‘real _shady_ shit’ on them. Rodion was doubtful; it wasn’t _impossible_ but it also wasn’t probable. The real shady shit would have much better guards.

Work was pretty boring. All he needed to do during the day was walk the building, check the cams, and turn away anybody who had questionable credentials. The building was usually empty most days, the only people on-site would be the housekeeping, maintenance crews, and of course, the security.

About an hour before he was scheduled to clock out, Rodion checked in with his supervisor who, after some teasing, allowed him to clock out early.

Café Orleans was a small restaurant not too far away from the military post that both Rodion and Capt. Killian had served at. The café had been decorated after the old country French style, and served some of the best coffee in Moscow. Captain Killian was waiting for him at the door dressed in civilian clothes which she still managed to make look like a uniform.

“Rodya, it’s been a while, how’s life on the outside?” She asked as they went to find a table.

“It’s been quiet, I’m sure you’d find it boring. And you? I heard you’re a captain now”, Rodion said as they sat at a nearby empty table.

“Yeah, I’ve been working my ass off to get there”, she replied, “It feels weird being back here, been what? 2 years already? This place hasn’t changed at all…”

“No, it hasn’t…” Rodion let them sit and reminisce a moment before diving back to business, “So, you said you had something for me on the _Anna Karenina_ ”.

“Yes, the _Anna Karenina_. You remember that we flag any ships with potential ties to organized crime. The _Anna_ has more flags than the entire United Nations combined. I ran a search on her last night and found out this: 20% of the listed crew had direct ties to organized crime, and a further 40% had some sort of criminal record”.

“So, you’re saying more than half of the crew could reasonably be motivated to stage a mutiny then?” Rodion asked, “That’s not really helpful...”

Killian nodded, then asked, “I’m curious, what’s the _Anna_ to you? It’s been two years since we last talked. What’s so special about this ship that it’s made you break the silence?”

“You remember my brother, Georgi? He was the taller, more good-looking one with my mom at the graduation ceremony”, Rodion gestured roughly his brother’s height.

“Yeah, I remember him. Obviously, I picked the wrong brother”, Killian joked.

“No offense, but you’re not his type. His husband works on the _Anna Karenina_ , missed an important call by a little over three days. Not something he normally does without warning. Georgi asked me to look into it a bit, I think the recent events have got him worried that something might have happened”.

“I’m sorry to hear that”, Killian responded, “I can send you the crew list if you’d like to do some background. But there’s a few names you should put at the top of your list”, Killian slid a tablet across the table, on it were three profiles. She pointed at one of them, a photo of a pale, haughty looking man, “Ship’s First Mate, Wesley James, age 28, Martian citizen. His brother, Markus, was arrested last year during a sting operation. Markus was a high-ranking operative for Red Sky Faction and I have a feeling Wesley is picking up where his brother left off”. Killian pointed to the second profile, a heavily scarred older man, “Listed as the chief welder Thomas Smith, real name Igor Alexandrov, 59, one of us- or, he used to be. Got those burns when he forced a reactor overload on a prison transport. Killed all the guards and half the inmates too. Hardcore underground. Served time in Luna Max, several stints in the Martian system too. Anything bad went down on that ship, I’d bet good money that he had something to do with it”.

Rodion pointed at the last profile, a thin, very young-looking man – the youngest of this rogue’s gallery, “I have a feeling you saved the worst for last, so, tell me, how is _this_ one worse than Alexandrov?”

“He’s the one we know the least about. With everyone else, there are obvious ties leading back to organizations like Red Sky. With him, there’s basically nothing, until six years ago _something_ happened and he was arrested, two years later he disappears again. Program kid, no family, no long-term associates, no criminal record”.

“Until six years ago”, Rodion concluded.

“I was able to grab a report from the Martian Judicial Archives that indicated after the event six years ago he spent two years in a Martian prison” Killian clarified, “What’s weird is that all the details of the offense and court records have been scrubbed”, she let it sink in, “you don’t see that often. Indicates he might have ties to a big shot, a _really_ big shot”.

“So, we have a guy that basically didn’t exist until six years ago and then when he finally slips up, someone _very_ powerful pulled whatever strings they had to make sure he disappeared again… No reason to do that unless he was worth the effort”, Rodion scratched his head, “Sounds to me like some sort of deep-cover operative”.

Killian nodded, “We don’t know his MO, or what he’s capable of. At least, not until you can get the original case records for whatever he was involved with six years ago”.

“From Mars? That’s going to be tough…”, Rodion was beginning to understand how Georgi must be feeling. The worst-case scenario was only getting worse. “I forgot, what was his name?”

“His name’s Sirius, aged 22-ish, from the 4th Deimos Prime Ward”.


	7. Chapter 3 - Solaris

Murphy collected the respirators and the water bottles quickly. Both of which the strange man inspected with a keen eye, “You better not be fuckin’ around with me, ya hear, Mork?” he warned him but ultimately they passed his inspection.

Murphy balked a little before handing his firearm over. It only took a cold reminder from Sirius to draw him back in line. The strange man directed Murphy into an empty cell and locked the door.

“Come on”, he said with a note of impatience in his voice, and Solaris complied. Ever since she was a child, she had been practicing what to do if she’d had the bad luck of being taken hostage – it tended to be a side effect of having her last name.

“So, you _do_ know something about the Henge”, she hissed at him. He’d have no other reason to go back.

He only grunted an affirmative and shoved her forward, “Let’s go”.

They proceeded through the admin offices, Sirius pushing her through quickly enough that the administrative employees at their desks barely noticed the hostage situation going on. She wanted to shout out, but she was pretty certain he wasn’t afraid of making good on his threat to kill her if anything went wrong. They arrived at the outer airlock and she was instructed to put on the respirator, which she did.

“So far, so good, doc, keep it cool and you get to walk out of this”, he reassured, “Now, show me the way back to the Gate”.

“The gate? Do you mean the Henge? Does that mean it’s some sort of entrance? Or portal?”

“Let’s just go, maybe you get some answer then”, Solaris noticed his English was accented, something Eastern European, maybe.

They stepped out into the pale sun and dust. Solaris led the way, she could try to lose him in the maze of the research village, she knew it better than he did. What stopped her was that she also wanted to find out more about the man’s relationship to the Henge. The mystery was just too tantalizing. It was a massive cavern system anyway; she could try to lose him once she got enough information out of him – she just had to play nice for now.

Her coworkers passed by, each consumed by their own quandaries, each oblivious to the danger she was presently in. The walk to the caverns took a while, and Solaris tried making conversation with her captor, but he seemed resistant. She remembered learning that stonewalling was a tactic used to maintain the necessary emotional distance required for a kidnapper to make the jump to killer. She needed to draw him in somehow, make him see her as human.

“Where are you from?” She asked him, trying to fill the silence, and then volunteered, “I’m from Mars, First Landing. Now, what about you?”

“Space” was all he answered. Another long silence followed.

“What do you do? For work? I’m a biologist”, she told him, “This is my first real field job”, she added.

“You’re fuckin’ talkative for a hostage”, was his answer, “Maybe I don’t like that, huh?”

“Sorry, my mother always says I talk too much when I’m nervous. I just talk, talk, talk. She says sometimes that she wishes I would shut up”.

“Sounds like a bitch”, Sirius commented.

The words stung. Solaris stayed quiet for the remainder of the walk to the caverns, her mother was a -difficult- person and their relationship had been extra strained of late, why of all other things to talk about had she brought her up? They arrived at the entrance of the caverns.

“Show me how to get down to the Henge”, Sirius asked.

“It’s not far, just down the tunnel”, she said as they stepped into the shadows.

“Uhhh…I guess that comment on your mother was a bit unfair?” Sirius asked her, he seemed a bit more relaxed now that they were under cover of the caverns and away from the open desert of the village. She’d heard Spacewalkers had a higher likelihood of agoraphobia much like how Planetsiders were more prone to claustrophobia. It had to do with the vastly different environments they spent their lives in.

“Only a little…I haven’t been able to get along with her for as long as I can remember. It’s why I took the job here – to get away. I needed a break”, Solaris explained.

“Made the right choice, family tends to hold you back. Best to leave before they can really get a hold of you”, he said.

“Is that what you did, leave your family?” she asked, then regretted it. It was too direct a question to ask a guy pointing a gun her way.

“No, I’d have to have _had_ a family to leave” was his response, but he didn’t seem offended by the line of questioning – he was just stating the facts according to himself.

“So, can you tell me what you want with the Henge now?” she asked again, “What did you mean when you called it a ‘gate’?”

“It’s a weird story and I’m not sure I trust you enough to tell you”, he deflected. He was getting more talkative, perhaps she’d get out alive after all.

“Funny you’re talking about trust when you’re the one pointing a gun my way”, she retorted, Sirius stopped then grabbed her arm. Hard. She’d probably have bruises. Had she finally said too much?

“Then tell me the truth”, he insisted, “Have you _ever_ experimented on people without their consent? Like with bioweapons, shit like that?”

Solaris nearly laughed but his expression betrayed not even the slightest indication of a joke. In fact, he looked terrified, so she answered, “No. I research animals, plants, bacteria sometimes. My work tends to keep me _away_ from people. Above all, the kind of research you’re talking about is _illegal_ , has been for a long time. For good reasons. We have really accurate computer models anyways, why would anyone want to do it?”

He seemed to think it over and decide her answer was good enough for whatever standard he’d set, then released her arm, “Okay. I believe you. I’ll tell you a little of what I know”.

As they walked further, the man began to describe without mincing the details the events that he claimed to have happened before he awoke to find himself at the Henge. He had an odd way of talking. Short sentences interspersed with heavy profanity. He stumbled over some words, too, as if he wasn’t very comfortable with English.

As he talked, Solaris noticed that certain details of his story didn’t add up. Like his background and the events that led up to his arrival. He kept mentioning something called the _Anna Karenina_ and referred to Earth like it still owned half the solar system. Even more improbable was his description of what she guessed was an experimental bioweapon. It all sounded like basic conspiracy theory talk but even though he left no detail out about the graphic details of his symptoms she noticed that his hands started shaking while talking about it. Whatever had really happened to Sirius, his story seemed very real to him. Once Solaris had decided where to start with her many questions, she stopped walking and he stopped next to her. In the dim light, he looked very skeletal.

“You mentioned you grew up in the Program, but that’s impossible”, she began, “Not to mention you’ve got a few things mixed up”.

“What you mean?”

“Well, to start with the first thing I mentioned, the Program’s been decommissioned for nearly 60 years, maybe more. I was never good at history but it hasn’t been a thing for a looong time”, she explained.

“60 years?!”, Sirius seemed genuinely shocked, “but that means – what year is it?!”

“It’s 3075, August 15th today”, Solaris told him. His face fell from shock to anguish which was quickly replaced by disbelief. Solaris wondered why the news would be distressing – sure, she hated Tuesdays as much as the next guy but the distress on his face was genuine. Too genuine for it to be a simple case of losing track of a few days.

“No”, Sirius said, “That’s not true. The year is 3005 – maybe 3006 at the latest – I was in that cell for a while but not for 70 years!”

Great. So, he _was_ delusional.

“Look”, she took her hand terminal out and opened up the calendar – it showed today, August 15, 3075. The man looked suspicious, and in a moment of empathy, she realized that she could easily be faking the device’s date. She opened a random news application and showed him the screen again. It showed an article discussing some proposed legislation on the table in the Martian United Planetary Congress – it was an awfully dry article, but it had the date very clearly listed multiple times. Faking an article like this would take too much work so she hoped it would help convince him. Sirius took the terminal and started reading it, he took a long time to read it. Long enough that she almost doubted that he even _could_ read it given his difficulty with the spoken English language. He looked confused and disappointed then handed the terminal back without question.

Solaris felt kind of sorry for him, he really seemed disappointed, “Are you alright?”, she asked gently.

He withdrew from her and turned away, “I will be”, was all he said in a semi-choked voice then started walking faster. Solaris had to practically jog to keep up with the man’s long legs.

They arrived at the outer ring of the Henge quickly at this pace. As Sirius drew close to one of the Monoliths the purple vines seemed to react to his presence, their glow brightening as he drew near. He was muttering to himself as he examined the cavern room for some evidence that only he seemed to know how to find then his face fell, “It’s dead… Why is it all dead?”


	8. Chapter 3 - Sirius

Orion’s thoughts were racing, and Sirius struggled to keep track while his own thoughts were swirling through his head. He got flashes of information, mainly in the form of images which were disjointed and difficult to comprehend. The Gate was dead, according to Orion, but Sirius didn’t know what that meant – how could a Gate be dead? He got a brief vision of the Gate which he somehow knew to be a long time in the past. The structure was vastly different, the pillars were all connected by a matrix, a lattice of vines – except they weren’t vines, they were like electrical cables except biological, they must have rotted between then and now. _That explains the malfunctions_ , Orion explained briefly, then he continued, _I wonder what would happen if we powered it back on again…_

Sirius felt a surge of energy building up through his core, his body temperature rising rapidly like some sort of flash fever. There was a subtle glow under his skin which he thought was the glow from the monoliths at first until it grew brighter than the ambient light. He stared at his hands, he thought he could see the silhouettes of his bones through the skin. He felt electrified like he could feel every single nerve impulse. Dr. Khorana stared too, her expression of shock turning into one of wonder and maybe even fear.

 _You need to discharge the energy into one of the pillars, just touch it, and I’ll flip the switches,_ Orion instructed.

Sirius turned to the nearest pillar, he could hear a low hum which he couldn’t tell if it was coming from the pillar or from himself. He reached towards the surface of it and the vines started to shift, reaching back to his outstretched hand. When he made contact, they surrounded his hand and curled tightly, trapping it in place. He shouted expecting pain, but instead his hand was engulfed in a sort of warmth. The vines slithered up his arm, stopping at his elbow. They were siphoning off the energy that had just surged. Sirius felt Orion debating which switches to flip and a brief memory that wasn’t his surfaced and suddenly Sirius could visualize exactly how the Gate worked and exactly how to power it back on, which Orion did. The vines retracted and Sirius felt suddenly very unsteady. Without the energy he felt tired and lethargic, like coming off of a manic episode. He leaned against the pillar and watched what was happening to the Henge.

The light from the pillar they had just plugged into spread across the many vines onto the other pillars. It travelled from monolith to monolith, each retaining some light then spreading it to a neighboring structure. Soon, the entire outer ring was lit by the light which then spread inwards to the inner ring which was lit just as fast.

“What’s going on? What did you do?”, Dr. Khorana asked, a note of panic in her voice.

“It told me to turn it on, so I did”, Sirius explained, “It wants to see what still works”.

“Who’s it?” she asked, her face full of confusion, “Who told you? And was that, what happened – the weird lights – how did you turn it on?”, she asked.

“The architect told me to, and I really don’t know how to explain what’s going on”.

“The architect? But I don’t see anyone else here? When did they tell you?”

“Just now, it’s been with me since I got here, in my head – kind of”, Sirius tried to explain. The look she gave told him that he’d just crossed whatever line she had set for suspending her disbelief. He thought they’d reach that point much sooner.

“I knew it! You’re fucking insane!”, Dr. Khorana shouted, “But somehow the Henge is reacting to you, and I want to know why”.

“Don’t we all”, a voice said from behind Sirius. He turned, pistol readied, and saw that it was Murphy and a team of security contractors. All were armed. They’d caught up faster than he’d anticipated, or maybe more time had passed underground than he thought, his sense of time was being kinda weird lately. He was outgunned and stuck in a cavern which probably didn’t have another exit. Even holding Dr. Khorana hostage again wouldn’t guarantee a way out. Still, it would stall for time and maybe the Gate would finish doing whatever it was doing, which might throw off Murphy and his men enough for Sirius to find a way out. He grabbed the scientist again and retreated to the center of the Henge, putting some distance between them and Murphy. _Orion! Help me out here!_

 _I may have found something to help us. Stall them,_ was all that he got from the alien.

“You know how this goes Murphy!” he shouted across the water.

“You finally remembered my name. How nice! But I’ve recently stopped giving a shit, apologies Dr. Khorana, but I’ve made my peace with the extra paperwork – neither of you get to leave here”, Murphy shouted back, then signaled to his men. They opened fire.

Sirius pushed Dr. Khorana, whose face wore an expression of utter shock, behind one of the pillars of the inner circle, “Stay here if you want to live”, he instructed, and she nodded. He peered around; Murphy’s men were fanning out. Orion would need to hurry up, seven to one – Orion and Dr. Khorana didn’t count – weren’t great odds. He fired a few shots and managed to hit one of the contractors, one down – six to go. A volley of shots from them drove him behind the pillar where he checked the round counter on the gun – only ten shots left and he hadn’t picked up an extra magazine, if only he’d bothered to count _before_ they had headed out. _Orion hurry the fuck up!_

He took careful aim and took out two of the contractors one right after another. He’d got a sight on a third but then his left leg was kicked out from under him and he fell. A bullet hole had been torn just above his knee; it went clean through but in his adrenaline rush he felt nothing. “Fucking fuck!” he shouted then fired two rounds in the direction of the attacking squad. He lucked out with one of them, which dropped another of Murphy’s men. Now it was three to one, better odds, but he was hit, and he only had two bullets to spend per person.

“You’re hit”, Dr. Khorana kneeled next to his injured leg.

“Yeah, get back to cover, I’ll be fine”, he hissed at her through gritted teeth between volleys of shots.

“I can bandage it, we need to slow the bleeding”, she said.

“Fine. Do it!”, he leaned out from cover and fired twice. He missed both times; only four shots left so he ducked back under cover. Dr. Khorana took this opportunity to fish out a bandanna from one of her pockets and tie it around his leg, it promptly soaked through with blood.

Suddenly, a purple light flared, and the shooting stopped as everyone froze, uncertain what had caused it.

 _Sorry for the delay, but this is our ride out_ , Orion explained as another flash of light flared, then grew until it obliterated everything from sight. Sirius had barely any time to ask where they were going before everything disappeared.

When he opened his eyes again, they were in a storage closet.


	9. Chapter 3 - Rodion

Today was his day off and Rodion had run as thorough a background check as he could on the crew-list. It involved mostly cross checking different social media profiles, job board profiles, and whatever other publicly available information he had access to that wasn’t hidden behind a Martian information block. Like Killian had said, the list of those with a criminal record was longer than those without.

He recorded another message to Dima, maybe he’d only forgotten to call Georgi back and Rodion’s message might remind him. Or maybe something had happened, and Dima was afraid to burden his spouse with it. He might well be more open to speaking with someone ‘less involved’. Before he sent it, he attached a small program designed to automatically send back a notification once the message was opened. It would record when it was opened, for how long, as well as a location snapshot. He felt bad about violating Dima’s privacy like that, but he felt that the man would understand once Rodion had a chance to explain why.

He also recorded a new message. This time to the man listed as the captain of the Anna Karenina. He kept it short.

“Hello Captain…” he scrolled back up to the officer’s list, “Conolly. My name’s Safronov. Rodion Nikolaevich. A family member of mine is working on your ship and we are afraid that something has happened to him. His name is Dmitri, his id number is…”, he read it off from a note near his desk, “Listed as a mechanic’s supervisor. I don’t want to ask too much of you, sir, but my family would really appreciate confirmation that he’s still on the ship and that he’s unhurt. His family’s very worried, could you have someone let him know we’d like for him to call? Thanks in advance, captain”.

He shut down the call. If he did the math right, the _Anna_ could be 30-40 light minutes away. It would be reasonable to expect another half hour to an hour before the captain got around to answering a civilian’s request. It would take time for him to check in with Dima, and any response Rodion could expect would take another 30-40 minutes to arrive here in Moscow. If the captain was unconvinced, he’d have to go through the whole thing again. It would be hours before he could expect an answer either way. He debated attaching the read-receive program to this message, but he feared the ship’s security system would flag it as a security risk and delete it.

He spent the rest of the day taking care of various errands that he hadn’t had time for during the work week. Every time he received a message notification, he expected to find a message back from Conolly or Dima. Instead, he received a message from Killian while he was busy scrubbing down his tiny kitchen.

CAPT. KILLIAN: Did a little more digging on your case, found something weird. Can we meet up?

RODION S: Sounds good, where?

CAPT. KILLIAN: Your place? I’m in the area right now.

Rodion looked around his apartment. Killian had been here before, but that was when he was still new there and had treated the space with respect. He’d kept things clean and orderly then. Now it was a mess of scattered papers, books, and old coffee mugs. Some of his clothes had been scattered across the living room between loads of laundry. He was only scrubbing the kitchen down because he’d found a trail of ants venturing too far onto the only empty food prep surface.

RODION S: How far out are you?

CAPT. KILLIAN: 10 minutes.

Rodion could only smile. Of course, she was only ten minutes away. She must’ve been planning to see him since their dinner. Did she miss him as much as he’d missed her? He sprang into action, triaging the clutter around him, focusing specifically on the worst of the mess. Before he got too far into it, he sent a reply to Killian. He spent a few seconds trying to come up with something that sounded casual but not too distant. An exclamation point would be casual, but would it come off as desperate? A period made it a statement, but would she find the message begrudging? He could soften it with an emoji, but that felt juvenile. He hit send on what he had written anyway.

RODION S: You know where to find me

He returned to cleaning/hiding as much of the clutter in his apartment as he could. Exactly 9 minutes from his last text, he heard a knock on the door. Killian was always early; you could count on that. He shoved a stack of papers underneath the cushion of an old living room chair, then opened the door to see Killian waiting. She smiled slightly when she saw him, so he smiled back as she stepped inside the apartment.

“It’s been so long since I’ve been here…”, she told him while she looked around. Her expression was focused, like she was evaluating the still-too-messy space for clues into how Rodion was living now. If that was the case, she wasn’t getting a great picture of his life.

“Would you like some tea?” Rodion offered, if only to get her to stop reading between the lines of his living situation.

She turned and nodded, so he stepped into the kitchen and found to his dismay that his only tea kettle was long overdue for a wash. He washed it just enough to where it looked acceptable, then chucked some tea inside and poured in some water. He set it to heat up, then joined Killian in the living room.

“How was your day?” he asked.

“Not bad, and yours?” She didn’t seem willing to go into the details.

“Same, same” he replied, then decided to dive into business, “So, what did you find?”

Killian swiped back a strand of hair, a little tell that Rodion recognized from their time together. It was something she did before giving what she felt was bad news. Now was probably the best time to get the tea. If he waited, it would be cold by the time the conversation came to the next natural pause. He excused himself and poured the now hot tea into the only clean vessels available, an old ceramic and fake filigree mug inherited from his grandmother and his old army thermos. When he returned to the room, he passed Killian the thermos and set the filigreed mug in front of himself, “Okay, so tell me what you found”.

“I decided to check if the _Anna Karenina_ was the only ship that went dark in the last few months. I found a few incidents that looked similar and then cross checked over the last four years. Check this list”, she placed her tablet in front of him. Rodion took it and scrolled through the list. There was the _Karamazov_ most recently, then the _Dostoevsky_ , the _Stenka Razin_ , the _Oktyabrsky_ , the _Voronezh_ , the _Niszhni_ _Novgorod_ , the _Irkutsk_ , the _A.S. Pushkin,_ the _Tolstoy_ , and the _Kamchatka_. _Ten ships_. All named in a similar vein. That usually meant they were owned by the same person or organization. From the naming conventions, it wasn’t a stretch to assume that the _Anna_ _Karenina_ also was owned by them.

“That’s a lot of ships… They _all_ disappeared?” Rodion asked her.

“All of them”, Killian answered, “They flew out of different ports but none of them ever made it to their destinations. That’s all old news, though, what I found last night is _weird_ ”. She gestured for Rodion to swipe to another page on the tablet. He swiped through and found a graphic made of overlaid flight plans. He immediately noticed the weird part. All ten flight plans intersected over a relatively small sector of space. Of all the trillions of kilometers of available space, why route them all through there?

“What’s in that spot that would be so important to send half a fleet of ships there?” He asked, “And what caused all these ships to disappear? Did any of the crew turn up?”

Killian took the tablet back from him and swiped to another page, “Only one crewmember from all these ships ever popped back up on the radar. Turned out he’d been violently ill and hospitalized the night before his ship, the _Stenka Razin_ , was set to depart. So, though he was listed on the crew roll, he was never on the ship”.

“Sounds like he was lucky as hell, but why hasn’t anyone made the connections before?”

“It’s the dates mostly, look. They all disappeared over several month intervals. Long enough and far apart enough that no one was looking for a pattern. There’s also the criminal factor…”

Rodion hazarded a guess, “Red Sky? All of them?”

“Definitely, though the connections wouldn’t hold up in court. Unfortunately, it means that all the investigations would be bare minimum or less. Station police don’t tend to care much about the disappearance of criminals. As to what’s in that zone, I know as much as you. There’s nothing in public record on Earth or on Mars that occupies that spot or orbit”.

“You sure it’s not anything classified out there?”

“If it’s Earth, not anything I’d have access to”, Killian replied, “but you know I’d have to say that anyways. If it’s Mars, we’ll never find out what’s hidden there”.

Rodion paused while he tried to piece together all the information Killian had just given him. What were the implications in the context of the _Anna’s_ disappearance? What was the timeline from ship out to bitter end? It had only been a few days, was Dima already dead? Had he even had a chance?

“Rodya, I know it looks bad”, Killian’s voice had taken on a softer tone, one he’d rarely heard from her, “Whatever I can do to help, let me know”. She reached out and touched his hand and he let her lace her fingers with his. When was the last time they’d held hands this way? He sighed and decided not to be the first to break contact.

“Thanks, Killian, I guess the most important thing now is figuring out how to tell my brother that his husband might be dead. I just don’t know how I’m going to tell him”.

He felt Killian give his hand a squeeze, a slight movement that was disproportionately soothing, “Don’t give up on Dmitri yet. Sure, you should tell your brother that something has happened – he deserves to know, but until you know for sure that he’s dead, it’s best not to say anything. We’re going to figure this out. I promise”.

“I hope you’re right”.


	10. Chapter 4 - Solaris

The closet she found herself in was a bog-standard janitor’s closet full of chemical bottles, mops, and some vacuums. The absolute mundanity of it compared to where she had just been almost made her laugh. What was immediately apparent to her was the low gravity – too low for Earth, or Mars even. She took her respirator off, slowly. She wasn’t sure if she could trust the atmosphere here, especially not after suddenly materializing here from Earth under the weirdest of circumstances. This could be some sort of hallucination or trick. She risked breathing in, and to her relief the air was good – if not a bit stale. The construction of the room was old, in the style of centuries ago, and there was a faint smell of something familiar, something gunpowder-y. This _had_ to be one of the lunar colonies. 

Sirius sat on the floor, gun still in hand, and he looked around cautiously. He seemed just as surprised as she was. He’d already removed his respirator and she could see that he was paler than usual. Solaris wasn’t sure what he had done back at the Henge – or the Gate, as he called it – but unless this was some weird form of afterlife no one had anticipated, they had just travelled millions of miles in what felt like an instant.

Her hands shook as she pulled her terminal out, the first question precipitating out of many: _How instant_ was _it?_ The monitor showed nothing, nothing that made sense, whatever force that had brought them here had scrambled the device. Something in the back of her mind told her that the energy involved had to have some sort of direct or indirect effect on electrical circuits. That meant it could be _observed_. What that meant to science was groundbreaking and she intended to follow up on the details of how it all worked, but right now she was in a janitor’s closet somewhere on the moon, there was a strange man with a hole in his leg, and her boss had just tried to kill her. All of these seemed much more pressing.

She crouched next to Sirius, he was breathing quickly through gritted teeth, his injury had to hurt a lot. His blood had already soaked through the bandanna and started to pool on the floor. He needed a hospital, and soon. She glanced around the room and found a few clean towels which she wrapped around his leg and tied in place with some large zip ties she had found.

“Come on, we need to get you to a hospital”, she told him.

“No. No hospital”, Sirius insisted. Solaris didn’t argue, she guessed that he’d probably insist against it, but he wasn’t in good enough shape to put up any real kind of resistance if she _tricked_ him into going.

“Fine. But there’s no point dying in here. I have a friend, he’s a doctor – a real one. He can fix your leg off the books, we just need to get to his place”, she lied, hoping her face didn’t give her away.

“Fine, let’s go”, Sirius agreed and then started to get up. Solaris went to help but he waved her off, “Grav’s low enough here that it won’t be a problem”. He checked his pistol again, then tucked it into a pocket. Solaris let herself relax a little, it seemed like he wasn’t planning on shooting her, so far. He’d been giving an awful lot of mixed signals about that lately. She wondered if he had been bluffing the whole time – he didn’t seem like the type who enjoyed killing, but maybe that was her optimism speaking too loudly.

The closet led out to a larger hallway which looked exactly like every other hallway in the lunar bases. A low arched ceiling supported the tons of lunar rock and dust overhead, and for some reason they had decided to paint everything tones of grey, as if the moon itself wasn’t grey enough. Solaris wondered how long it would take for Murphy to call the university and tell them she’d disappeared with a madman who’d just shot four of their employees. What would her parents say? Or do? More importantly, what would she say to them when they found out she was alive?

A few people passed by largely unconcerned about the two newcomers. The moon was only sparsely populated nowadays. Before, it had been full of life, the halls always filled by workers, residents, and tourists. Solaris had never experienced this; she’d only seen the pictures of massively crowded hallways when she learned about the pre-war history in school. After the war and Earth’s self-destruction just about everyone left. It was too depressing to constantly see the husk that was once a blue marble. Only the barest minimum remained, most to keep the stations operational but there was a dwindling number of those too stubborn to leave that made up the rest of the lunar population. 

They arrived in a sort of common area with wall screens playing a few newscasts and a few sad-looking greenspaces that appeared to be suffering from a combination of under-watering and poor air quality. Something on the wall-screens caught her eye, her father. Immediately, she could tell something was wrong.

He looked older. A lot older. Last time she’d seen him, his jet-black hair had only been slightly greying at the edges. It had been something he’d hidden with carefully applied dye. Now, in this image, her father’s hair had shocks of white that he hadn’t bothered to hide. The crow’s feet around his eyes had deepened and he was noticeably thinner. Compared to last time she saw him he looked like an entirely different man. What had happened?

She turned her attention to the subtitles, wishing they’d scroll by faster so she could read what was going on more effectively. His nametag listed him as the president of the Martian United Planetary Congress but that was wrong, wasn’t it? The elections weren’t for another 4 months, and he’d never announced his candidacy. He wouldn’t be eligible for another 4 years, so why was he listed as the president? This was a mistake that several million people would notice, that they would be affected by, so why wasn’t the newscast being pulled off air?

As she pondered, a date rolled by, and she almost missed it – maybe she had. What she thought it said made no sense. She watched more closely to see if it would repeat. It did. It was still August- that made sense. The day had changed, it was now the 16th. They had lost a full day. Then the year scrolled by and it was this one that made the least sense; according to the newscast it was 3081. If the date was accurate, they had lost a lot more than a day. _Six years and a day_. Exactly.

She looked back at Sirius who had settled into a poorly lit section of wall and was watching the common area closely. He looked like he was trying to disappear into that part of the wall. If she’d just been passing by, she might not have noticed him. It was surprising how well this tall man could blend in.

“Hey, you need to look at this”, she called. He came out from his hiding place and studied the screen. _I wonder if he recognizes my father’s last name,_ she thought, _would he make the same connection everyone else does?_

Instead he asked, “What am I supposed to be seeing here?” He looked inattentive, like the goings-on of the common area were more concerning.

“Look at the date, it’ll flash by again, notice anything weird?” She said as she pointed to the info text.

Sirius looked annoyed, “For me, _everything_ is weird. Why are you asking me?”

“I…really…want to be wrong about this, but I think I’m beginning to understand your situation better”, she paused to gather her thoughts, keep the fear that was slowly creeping in from showing in her voice, “a _lot_ better”.

“What do you mean by that?”

“That ‘jump’ just cost us six years…and a day”, she said as the interview with her father, the now President Khorana, concluded.

“So?” Sirius just shrugged. His body language was unbothered, but his expression was hard to read.

Solaris felt a brief flash of anger, Sirius wasn’t understanding the weight of what was happening. She had lost six years of her life. Six years. Gone. Six years that she could have been working, developing her research, and six years that her friends and family had gone without answers. Her life was in shreds, so, why couldn’t he be more understanding? But…of course. She’d only lost six years. He’d lost 70, what was another six years on top of that?

But… _six years?_ What was she expected to do now? What could she do? Solaris walked to one of the benches in the little greenspace, but rather than sit down, she kept walking. It was like she couldn’t control her feet anymore, her body automatically responding to some need to get away, as if physical distance was a sufficient substitute for emotional distance. Anything to keep her from thinking too hard about the reality of her situation. From across the room, she heard Sirius say something, but that wasn’t important now. What was important was putting her life back together, but how?

What would her university say when she showed up out of the blue after six years? Who sat in her office now? Which of her grad students had stayed on? Was her research even relevant now, or had someone else finished the work? Were her credentials even valid now that she’d been out of the field for six years? She would have some catching up to do. And her family. What would they say?

She bumped into someone who shoved her roughly aside. She should have been paying attention to where she was walking.

“Watch where you’re going, dumbass!” The man she had bumped into appeared drunk, but his posture was aggressive. He was looking for a fight. Behind him were three equally inebriated men, similar postures. From the way they looked and acted, they had to be gangsters.

“I’m sorry! I didn’t see you!” she said, raising her hands both in defense and placation. The man she ran into approached, still posturing but not committed to escalation yet. She heard footsteps behind her, and the lead man’s attention turned to their source. The way he squared his shoulders in response told her he felt threatened. They were a spacefaring civilization, and yet, people still acted like animals.

“Is everything alright?” She heard Sirius ask. She turned to see him approaching the group slowly. There was something familiar about his posture, the cautious way he carried himself, and she briefly remembered a ghost she saw a long time ago.

Solaris turned to leave, but found her arm caught by the man she’d run into.

“I know you”, he slurred.

“You must be mistaken, I’m sorry”, she tugged at her arm.

“I don’t make mistakes”, the gang leader insisted, and his followers closed ranks behind him.

“Just let the doc go, and we’ll be on our way”, Sirius asked, he’d gotten close enough to be just out of immediate reach of the gang. He kept his hands up in a placating manner, but Solaris could tell they were hovering close to the flightsuit pocket he’d stashed his gun in.

“What are you going to do about it, Spacer?” one of the followers challenged.

“Yeah, what she to you, huh?” the gang leader followed-up, then everything happened really fast.

She remembered the gang leader shoved Sirius and remembered the sound of a pistol clattering against the ground. Then everything went silent. Too silent for too long. She remembered it clearly, the expressions on everyone’s face. The short moment of shock that flashed across everyone’s faces which was then erased as the involved parties sprang into action. What happened next wasn’t clear, wasn’t important, she just remembered hearing gunshots. Her next clear memory saw Sirius…

on the ground, blood spreading from underneath his head…

she could see bits of bone and muscle…

white and red scattered on the muted concourse floor.

Somebody was screaming…

it sounded a lot like her.


	11. Chapter 4 - Sirius

He remembered the sound of the gunshots, even remembered brief flashes of the man’s hand and the brightness of the muzzle flash. Two of them. Then the pain which flashed in, then out. Then falling, falling, falling. Falling infinitely into a black pit as noise and color faded away. Then he hit the bottom. It was solid, it was moving?

He felt himself rising, coming back to himself, to his body. Noise and light trickled in. He opened his eyes. He was being pushed on a cart, some sort of tarp over his body through which small pinpoints of light trickled through. The metallic smell of blood was all around him, but he felt no pain – not in his head, or his chest, or even from the hole he’d had in his leg. He felt – for the most part – normal, if not a little nauseated.

 _Welcome back_ , Orion told him.

 _Why am I not dead?_ Sirius asked, _This is the second time I haven’t died when I was supposed to._

 _Are you disappointed that I brought you back?_ Orion asked, _As long as you’re my host, I can’t afford to let you die. Each time you get close to death, your body regenerates back to the established baseline. As long as I’m with you, you cannot die._

Sirius wasn’t sure what to make of it. First, he was relieved that he was alive but also, why him? He wondered if he wouldn’t be better off dead. He wouldn’t have to live with the memory of being shot in the head anymore. Who _wants_ to remember that?! If that was how it worked, being immortal didn’t sound so good. He wondered if Dr. Khorana was still alive – maybe he should go check? What was he supposed to do?

 _She might prove to be useful to us,_ Orion commented.

 _Useful to_ you, Sirius corrected, _Still, she was decent enough, and I’m mad at these assholes anyways._

“I swear I just saw that stiff move”, a voice came from his right.

“Relax, you’re always so jumpy, might be twitching cos he had his brain fried - or maybe you’re just a fuckin’ chicken”, a voice teased from his left.

These two must have been picked to dispose of his body. He wondered how they planned to do it. The recyclers were always a good option if they could get in there. Hiding him in the shadow of a crater or a cavern was always a good strategy if the recyclers were being watched. He heard an ID reader beep – it sounded like they’d gone with option one. He needed to act fast, if he wanted to have the advantage. They rolled the cart off to the side, their footsteps retreating. They must be making sure the coast was clear and everything was turned on right. It got _real_ inconvenient for a lot of people if a body was processed through poorly.

He moved slowly and found that they hadn’t bothered taking his gun – it was a piece of shit anyways – but that was a key mistake. Peeking out from under the tarp he saw that they had gone around a corner, so he carefully slid off the cart as silently as he could manage. He briefly considered disappearing right then and there, but he’d never find out where they took the doctor.

 _You’d feel bad if you let her die_ , Orion told him, somehow sounding smug with no voice.

 _Shut up_ , Sirius thought at the alien. Still, he stayed.

The men were coming back, they were talking about some thing or another. Sirius found a little inset section of the wall to take cover in. He counted on them still being under the assumption they were alone and not check the edges of the room too thoroughly, and they behaved predictably. As they rounded the corner, they went to inspect the cart.

One man, who Sirius had assumed to be the one who’d been on his left as they arrived, pulled back the tarp only to see that the cart was now empty. Both men jumped in surprise, looking at each other in panic, “WHERE’D THE FUCKIN’ BODY GO?!” one exclaimed.

“Right here”, Sirius growled from behind them. They turned comically in surprise and Sirius shot the Left-Side guy right in his terrified face.

“Boo”, he said to the other one who cowered to the floor practically weeping. Sirius took the permanently dead man’s weapon from his holster; it had a full clip. Things were finally turning up. He turned to the terrified man.

“Where’d they take the doc?” He asked.

The man just whimpered something unintelligible. He really was a fuckin’ chicken. Sirius pulled him up by his collar. The low lunar gravity made it easy.

“I said, where’d they take the doc?”, Sirius asked again, the man’s eyes were glazed with fear, “Come on, they gotta have told you where to come back to after you were done here. If you tell me, you get to live”.

“Really?” The man looked cautiously hopeful. He started to say something, then was cut off by a bullet. Sirius cursed then let the dead man drop, then turned ready to fire on the bastard who had silenced his only lead.

A woman stood in the doorway. She was improbably tall and muscular, like a boxer, or more likely a marine. She had her gun trained on Sirius and the two stared each other down the barrels of their guns. She looked like a planetsider and her expression told him she was absolutely pissed-off. There was a massive knife strapped to her hip. The handle looked hand carved. The skin on one of her arms was mottled, pale on dark skin. Looked like a poorly done skin graft.

“Why the _fuck_ did you shoot that guy? He was about to tell me where they took my friend – uh, yeah, friend”, Sirius felt slightly embarrassed, he wasn’t really sure what to call Dr. Khorana, ‘hostage’ didn’t really sound better. The verbal stumble had checked some of his initial anger, but he was still pretty angry.

“I’ve been hunting these two fuckwits down for days, you fucking _Spacer_ ”, she injected as much aggression into the slur as possible. If words could cut, he’d be bleeding out from that one alone, “and somehow you get the drop on them first. Who hired you?!” She demanded.

“Who hired _me?_ I don’t work for anybody. These guys tried to kill me then they took my…friend…with them. Now, she might be dead, thanks a fuckin’ lot!”

“So, nobody hired you then? You don’t care about the bounty?”, she asked, her expression going from aggressive to faintly bemused.

“You can keep the fuckin’ thing. Since I can’t help the doc, I just want off this goddamn moon”, Sirius felt disappointed. Even with all he’d done to her – ruined her life, ruined her job, killed a few of her co-workers, Dr. Khorana had still helped him and had tried to save his life – if that meant anything anymore post-Orion.

The tall woman lowered her gun, but only slightly. It was enough to let Sirius know that she wasn’t planning on shooting him immediately but was still keeping the option open, “About that… I know where those guys work out of. One of the Blue Sky Militia cells owns a place not far from here. I’ve seen those two there a lot. I’d bet money that’s where they took your friend. I’ll give you the address since I technically owe you for the guy you killed, do you have a terminal address I can send to?”

Sirius lowered his gun just as she had. He would de-escalate as much as she was willing to de-escalate. Even if Orion was going to keep him alive, the thought of getting into an all-out fight with her was soberingly terrifying, “I don’t even have a terminal, and I haven’t been here in a long, long time. All of this is new to me”, he gestured at the recycler room.

The woman looked puzzled, “This stuff hasn’t been new for a few decades, is this your first time on the moon?”

Sirius shrugged, “No, I’ve been here before, unfortunately. It’s just a long story”.

“Well, I’ll have to hear it sometime. My name’s Jaliss, Jaliss Alexander. I’m a bounty hunter, been working Luna for a few weeks. If I’m going to be showing you around, I’d like to know your name too”, she extended her hand.

Sirius took it, “I’m Sirius”, they shook hands somewhat awkwardly. Jaliss holstered her pistol while doing so and didn’t let go of his hand until he’d done the same. If things had devolved into a physical fight, Sirius had no doubt he would lose, gun or no gun. She was as tall as him and easily twice his weight.

“That’s a dog’s name! You have a last name?”, Jaliss asked.

“No”, Sirius said. The ‘dog name’ bit had gotten old a long time ago.

Jaliss nodded, then stepped away and took a few pictures of the dead men, “Need to have proof of death”, she explained, “You sure you’re fine giving up the bounty?”

“Yeah, whatever, let’s just go”, Sirius replied. _I wonder how much money I’m giving up, I sure could use it,_ he thought but decided it wasn’t worth potentially angering his new ally. He could work out his financial issues later.

“Okay, follow me”, she instructed, then led him through the corridors. She was right, it wasn’t far.


	12. Chapter 4 - Rodion

Knocking on Georgi’s door was the second-hardest thing Rodion had ever done. The first had been breaking up with Killian several years ago. That had been a rough breakup.

Georgi answered on the third knock, “Rodya. Did you find something already?”

His brother’s face was lit up with hope and Rodion felt his stomach sink even more at the thought of disappointing him. Rodion only nodded and made his way into the apartment. Just like the last time they spoke; the two brothers took their places in the living room.

“So, what did you find? Is Dima okay?” Georgi asked. Rodion paused while he tried to collect his thoughts, his stomach felt like it was made of lead.

“We think that something happened to the _Anna Karenina_ ”, Rodion told him.

Georgi’s face fell, “Something happened? And who do you mean by we?”

Rodion nodded, “I asked Killian to help me with this. She has access to a lot more information than either of us could get to”.

“Killian? Anna Killian? I thought you two weren’t talking anymore?” Georgi asked. Of anyone, he knew the most about how their relationship had crumbled. He’d been Rodion’s support during the breakup.

“Yeah, she was the only one to reply. She’s a captain now. She told me that the _Anna_ wasn’t the first ship to disappear”.

“So, it’s confirmed the ship’s disappeared?”

Rodion nodded again, “We don’t have tracking on her since she’s Martian, but I’ve sent the captain several messages and heard nothing back. Also, there’s this:” Rodion brought up the graphic that Killian had put together, “All of those ships were supposed to pass through that zone of space. All of those ships disappeared. Now, look at the _Anna’s_ intended path”.

Georgi’s eyes widened, “She’s been out long enough to mean that she went through there too, had to have went through there recently…” He leaned forward and put his head in his hands. “D-Did any of the missing ships’ crews come back?”

Rodion set his jaw, this was the question he didn’t want to answer. “No. The only one they were able to find again was a guy who missed his ship-out”.

Georgi’s face twisted in anguish. “Tha- No - That means that if the _Anna_ disappeared like these others then. Then…” He stood suddenly and went into the kitchen. Rodion didn’t see him for a few minutes, then he returned with a bottle of homebrewed chacha and two teacups. His hands shook as he poured the liquor out. He offered one to Rodion who refused then gulped both down one after the other. “I can’t be sober for this”, he explained. His eyes were red, like he had been trying to keep back tears.

Rodion felt a flash of worry. His brother had struggled with alcohol problems in his early years. Georgi couldn’t afford to spiral back into alcoholism. Not now, not while he had Alisa to take care of. He needed to give Georgi some hope. Something that would keep the darkness at bay while they figured everything out.

“Look, Georgi, the thing is, we don’t know for certain that the _Anna_ disappeared the same way as the other ships. Killian and I, we’re going to figure this out. No matter where Dima is, we’re going to get him home”, Rodion consoled. Georgi just nodded in response.

“In the meantime, you shouldn’t drink too much of that shit”, Rodion gestured at the chacha. Georgi smiled slightly in response.

“You’re one to talk… If I remember your teenage years right, you could put away more of this shit than I ever could”, he noticed Rodion’s worried expression, “I know. I know. I’ll take it easy. I just need some time to… process this”.

“Do you need me to stay?” Rodion asked, “I don’t mind staying over if it would help”. If he could stay, he could encourage his brother to drink more water than alcohol.

His brother shook his head. “I’ll be fine. I just need some time to myself, but I appreciate your offer”.

“Okay”, Rodion felt hesitant to leave his brother in crisis, “If you need anything…”

“I’ll call. I know”.

The two stood, Georgi was already looking a bit unsteady from the alcohol. They embraced then Rodion left.

When he returned to his apartment, he checked his messages for anything back from Captain Conolly. Nothing. He checked the Read-Receipt Application Manager for confirmation that his message to Dima had been read. Also, nothing. The message hadn’t been opened yet. It had been a week now since Georgi had come to him with the problem and three weeks since Dima’s last contact. Had his message even been received? How would he find that out? He needed someone who could track the message’s path across the comms satellites. There was one person who might help. He opened his conversation with Killian.

RODION S: Can you come over?

He cleaned up his apartment while he waited for her response. If Killian was coming over, he might as well tidy up and save himself the embarrassment of the last time she visited. Even if she wasn’t coming the place needed a good clean anyways. It felt oddly good to clean, as if by setting clutter to order he could bring order to the chaos of his family’s lives. It surprised him how quickly the years of mess took shape into a semblance of order. He’d reached a sort of meditative state by the time he heard the ring of a new message tone.

CAPT. KILLIAN: I can, but I don’t get out of work until late. Can you tell me what’s going on?

RODION S: It’s about the case. I’d prefer to explain in person. I can wait.

CAPT. KILLIAN: That’s worrying…

CAPT. KILLIAN: I’ll let you know when I’m coming over.


	13. Chapter 5 - Solaris

They had shoved her into a small chamber that she surmised to be a hastily emptied storage room. The path they had taken to get here was convoluted; she swore they had doubled back on themselves a few times. She supposed it was to keep her from being able to describe how to get here, wherever ‘here’ was.

Outside, voices were arguing. Solaris wondered if her capture had been planned, or if it was the result of opportunity. But mainly, she wondered what had happened to Sirius, he’d been relatively confident until now. Then he got shot. Just as things were starting to get interesting. She had so many questions, about the teleporting, about the Henge-gate, about the architect he had only just briefly mentioned before all this went down. The Henge-gate had used him, or some energy that he had, as a power source to power their jump. And the Architect, Sirius had said he heard him talk in his head, was it some sort of parasite? Or symbiote? What did it look like? Where did it come from?

Sirius had also talked about an artefact and pointed out the Henge monoliths as exactly the way it looked. His architect had been trapped in one, were there more hidden inside the monoliths? Did that mean there were more of these formations – no – constructions somewhere in this solar system? And why _this_ system, and why _Earth_? Was it merely a matter of convenience? Coincidence? Or had they anticipated the evolution and proliferation of intelligent life? Did that mean there were other systems capable of sustaining life?

She wondered what it felt like, to host an Architect. Did it feel completely alien? What kind of biological markers did it leave? Did it change things at the cellular level? If this hadn’t happened, she might have been able to get a blood sample from him, run a few tests at a friend’s lab. What if there was nothing different? Would she have been able to get him to agree to a brain scan? Would this Architect leave some quantifiable metric that she could observe and study?

She let herself follow this path of obsessive questioning because the alternative was panicking about her situation. A situation that she knew would likely happen to her at some point, her father was too well-known and powerful for it not to happen. Her family had made a name for themselves as the most powerful politicians and business-leaders in the whole system and had acquired many, many enemies over the decades. She had hoped that academia would afford her a way out, away from the public spotlight and away from the targets on their backs, but no matter how hard she tried to get away she would always be pulled back.

She had grown up terrified. Something her mother had never acknowledged or appreciated. Why did learning proper etiquette and dress matter when one day they could all be assassinated? Did it matter if she would look nice in a coffin? Did it really matter if your hair was well-done and your nails were neatly trimmed in a ransom video? She remembered being as young as five, and already knowing by heart what to do if the house was under attack – these steps if it was a shooter, this process for gas, another process if the attack came by air. She had always envied the other children, the ones without fear, who could live, knowing that today and tomorrow were guaranteed.

She knew, for certain, that her grandfather would never agree to pay a ransom. He had never paid a ransom in his life, something he was proud of, even though one of her sisters had paid the price for it. And if her grandfather said no, there was nothing her father could say or do to change the man’s mind. Solaris hoped that these particular kidnappers would let her go once they realized they’d get no money for her, but she had taken the hostage preparation classes and knew that they’d be more likely to double-down. They’d get the same amount of prison time either way once the Law caught up to them. She only wished she had more time to work on this Architect question. She could almost see the paper she’d write. It would have made her a household name in in the biological sciences – she was sure of it and if not this one, then the next one definitely.

She heard shouting and snapped out of her self-pitying reverie. Footsteps ran past the door, but no one came inside. There was something going on outside her prison, and it sounded violent. _What could possibly be worse than this?!_ She stood, and paced the cell, looking for something she could use – as a weapon or a tool. They’d been detailed, the only thing left in the room was dust. _Maybe one of them will have a severe dust allergy_ , she joked to herself, _I could collect it and throw it in their face_.

Then she heard gunshots, and briefly flashed back to when she saw Sirius get shot. She felt herself getting nauseous again, but she willed herself not to be sick. The gunshots continued, and it took a bullet ripping through one side of the room to the other to remind her that the walls weren’t bulletproof and neither was she. She took to the floor, unsure of where would be safest, it seemed the shots were coming from all around. She hated herself for flinching with every shot, she wished she could be braver. Then the shots stopped, not all at once, but tapered off until there were none to be heard. A tense silence ensued, or maybe she’d been deafened by the gunshots.

Solaris opened her eyes slowly. The walls of her cell were riddled with bullet holes. If she’d been standing during the firefight, she would have absolutely been hit. She could see light streaming through the perforations which was interrupted as a figure walked by. There was someone _alive_ out there. But who? And which side were they on? There was a distinct possibility that neither of the involved parties were on her side. Was this the frying pan or the fire?

The door handle rattled, and someone swore. Solaris crept to the farthest corner, she wanted the most space between her and whoever this was. She wasn’t sure what she was planning to do, run? Fight? Both seemed laughable, but either was better than meekly going along with whatever _their_ plan was. The door swung slowly open, and Solaris crouched, tense, ready to spring into some sort of action. She could see a man’s silhouette lit dimly by the lights outside. She decided she was going to fight.

The man stepped forward and Solaris ran at him and punched him in the face before running out of the room. The joints in her fingers audibly cracked when they made contact, and her hand exploded with pain. Another tall figure stepped in front of her in the dim light. A woman, tall and built like a rugby player. Colliding with her felt like hitting a wall and Solaris bounced back to the floor. The woman’s face fell when she saw her, “Hey Spacer, _this_ is your ‘friend’?”

Solaris turned, hardly believing her ears. The man had stumbled out of the doorway and was rubbing his jaw which had already started to bruise, “Damn, doc, you got a mean right hook”, Sirius said.

Solaris had no idea whether to cheer for her unexpected rescue, vomit from the day’s stress, or faint because her adrenalin high was crashing – so she did all three more or less simultaneously.


	14. Chapter 5 - Sirius

After Dr. Khorana’s impressively gross reaction to the day’s events had passed, Sirius and Jaliss had helped her up, brought her outside, then got her a bottle of water from a vending machine. Her hand was starting to bruise, and Sirius suspected she had probably fractured something. The bruise on his face ached. For someone who didn’t know how to punch right, Solaris could still hit hard. With their mutual friend taken care of, Jaliss had gone back inside to clean up the mess they had made of the BSM hideout which, Sirius found out as he went back in, involved mostly looting various objects from the dead.

“Hey, what did you mean when you saw the doc?”, he asked, looking around for something he could also take that hadn’t already been claimed. He found a few clips of ammo that Jaliss hadn’t spotted and pocketed those. He didn’t want to have to run out of ammunition any time soon.

“You seriously don’t know?”, Jaliss asked.

“You could say I’ve been out of the loop for a while”.

Jaliss’ eyes narrowed as she tried to make sense of that, “She’s the second-youngest daughter of Vitas Khorana, you know, multi-trillionaire, tech tycoon, oligarch, and current president. Her family pretty much owns Mars”.

“And…so, why don’t you like _her_?”

“Did you not hear what I said? All those kids of oligarchs are lazy, entitled, irresponsible, practically sociopaths – they don’t have to work a day in their lives, it’s easy not to like them”.

“But the doc is none of that, I only met her yesterday and she’s a lot different from what you say”, Sirius argued.

“Well, you only met her yesterday, give it time”, Jaliss dismissed. She packed the items she had looted into a duffel she had found in a locker then took one of the less messy terminals and tapped a few things into it, “Well, that’s it for me, I guess. Here”, she offered the terminal to Sirius, “Since you don’t have one”.

“Thanks, I guess I’ll have to learn how to use it”, Sirius accepted it and studied it. It was a black rectangular touchscreen-based device, sleek and smooth. Devices like these had ended up being rare, for some reason or another they had fallen out of favor during his time, it was strange that they were so ubiquitous now.

“You sound like my grandpa”, Jaliss laughed, “but seriously, when you’re tired of waiting on Her Royal Highness out there give me a call, my contact info’s in there. You did really good today in the firefight and I could use someone with your skills watching my back”.

“Uh…Okay, thanks”. They shook hands again and Jaliss left. Sirius spent a few moments picking through the loot that was left, he could make a small profit selling some of the things Jaliss had left. He had a sneaking suspicion she had intentionally left these behind for him. Packing them up in a backpack he had found, he left the building and walked over to where Dr. Khorana was sitting. She was still pale but looked a little more put together than the last time he had seen her.

“Hey, doc, you alright?”, Sirius asked.

She jumped a little at his voice, “You’re not supposed to be alive, _why_?”

“That’s a question I have too, but I guess it all chalks down to me being lucky”.

“ _Lucky?”_ , she looked incredulous, “A bullet getting caught on a terminal is lucky, surviving a headshot is a hell of a lot more than _lucky_ ”, her voice was bordering on hysterical.

“Look, I’ll explain it all. I promise”, Sirius placated, “but we need to get off the street, I’d hate to get stopped by cops. I have a few things with me that would be difficult to explain away. Do you know anywhere we can hide out and clean up? A cheap motel would work – I haven’t been here for a while, and I’m not sure where to look”.

Dr. Khorana’s expression steadied, and she took a deep breath. “I think it’s best that we split up, for now”, she told him, “I need some time alone, and I probably should call home to let them know I’m alright. That terminal you have, I can send you the address of a few of the places you’re looking for. If you click on it, it’ll show a map. Just follow that”, she instructed. She tapped her terminal against his, and both flashed green, “We can now call and text each other, and here’s that address. Also, here’s a little bit of money for dinner and new clothes – consider it a thank-you for rescuing me from those guys. And finally, I’ll call first, okay? I’ve had a rough day”, then she left. He noticed she had started to tear up before she went.

Sirius nodded, mostly to himself; he understood the desire to be alone. He was looking forward to getting his first real day off in nearly a hundred years and his first day as a free man in even longer.

Following the instructions on the screen, he was delighted to see that the place Dr. Khorana had sent him to was every bit as dive-y as he hoped. The host was unfazed by the blood on his clothes, and even agreed to have a fresh set brought to his room’s door from a nearby shop. He gave a fake name and struggled with payment, the process of which, which the host generously walked him through, and soon he found himself with a keycard and a room to himself.

The room was not particularly big but having spent so long in a tiny cell and the just-as-tiny crowded bunkrooms of the _Anna Karenina,_ it felt positively huge. There was a bed – a real sized one! – and a full bathroom with a low-grav adapted shower, which he eagerly climbed into. How long had it been since he’d last had the luxury of a shower! He spent enough water that the shower’s ration system beeped at him angrily but he ignored it. There was just something about the comfort of warm water. Drying off, he took a moment to look in the mirror. It made him grimace.

It seemed to him that he had aged so much since the last time he saw his own face. It had been a while since he had had the time to actually look at himself properly. The _Anna’s_ financial management had decided to save money by not buying frivolous things such as mirrors or up-to-date air recyclers. His hair, brown and slightly mousy, had grown out. He normally kept it very close cropped as it was easier to care for, but he found himself liking the longer look. He’d also grown out his beard, which he also liked but decided to trim anyway, at least to keep it clean looking. But the biggest and most astounding change was his eyes, their original color was more like a blue-grey if he remembered right, but now they reminded him more of the color of the glowing vines on the Henge, a sort of purplish-violet color. _What other changes happened to me that I_ can’t _see?_

Wearing only a towel, he stepped out into the room just in time to hear a chime at the door. Checking through the peephole he found that it was the new clothes he had ordered, a set of underwear, socks, some shirts, and some work pants. He paid for them with the balance on his terminal and dressed. 

Having cleaned himself and changed his clothes, he was surprised he was not more tired. Today had been a hell of a day. He turned to the wall screen then jumped in surprise. Orion was seated at the table and chairs.

“Now that that’s all sorted, it’s time to talk about next steps”, the alien said sternly.

“What?”, Sirius asked aloud, then stopped himself. What if someone could hear him talking to himself? _Next steps? What do you mean?_ Sirius asked.

“Since the Gate was less-than-useful in providing me the answers I want, we’re going to need to find the source”.

_What do you mean by source?_

“That space station will have more information if it’s still floating around. If not, someone would have to know where it’s been. We find that station, or what remains of it, we find the answers to both of our questions”, Orion explained.

 _You mean That Station? The one I died in?_ Sirius couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

Orion nodded slowly, “I know you don’t want to go back, but if I find what I need there, I might be able to help you. It’s possible...”, the alien paused thoughtfully, “well, you don’t belong in this time now, do you? That’s not right…”

Sirius stared wondering where Orion was going to take his line of thought. It was true, he felt out of place here. At least back in his own time he knew what to expect, but here? Everything was so different.

“Don’t take this a promise or anything like that. Merely a suggestion of possibility. I may not remember everything, but there a few things I do remember. One of these memories hints at the possibility of reversing the time jump. But I can’t confirm it until I get all of my memories back. And our best bet for it is to figure out how I got on that station. Where else better to find that out than the station itself?”

Sirius tried to think. _That doesn’t sound easy… I’m going to need to be looking around for stuff that They didn’t want to be found. No way of knowing if They’re even still active. What if the station’s just gone?_

“I agree that the station is unlikely to still be active”, Orion mused, “but we need to confirm that. We’re going to need to do some research, and I think our scientist friend might be a valuable asset in that regard. She seems well-connected”.

 _You’re right,_ Sirius answered, _but I don’t know if she’s gonna want to see much of me anymore. She didn’t seem too happy with me the last time she saw me._

“That’s something we’re going to have to work on”, Orion agreed, “but, if she gave us a way to contact her, that means she isn’t writing us off completely, at least”.

 _I guess I’ll have to wait until she contacts me again, in the meantime, nothing to do but wait and I’ll be damned if I’m spending that time sitting on my ass._ Sirius was going to get the shore leave he’d been waiting for. He turned to check on the backpack he’d taken from the hideout and when he looked back at the table, Orion’s image had gone.

He left his room, taking his backpack of stolen loot with him and asked the desk manager where he might find a place to liquidate it, promising a small percentage of the earnings if the place had good rates. Sirius was directed to a small hole-in-the wall place where he got a decent sum for everything. He returned, paid the desk manager his share plus a little extra, and asked him where to find some cheap alcohol and entertainment. The desk manager, more than happy to take his money pointed him in the direction of a few clubs that he could take his pick of. Sirius spent the rest of that night getting his money’s worth of cheap alcohol, drugs and some company. It was early the next morning when he finally stumbled back to his rented room and passed out, feeling the most relaxed he had been in a long time.


	15. Chapter 5 - Rodion

Rodion finished cleaning the apartment. It looked like a completely different person lived there. He washed out the teakettle and filled it with water so he could switch it on when Killian arrived so that the tea would come out sooner than last time. He found his only matched set of tea mugs and set them on the small dining table in his kitchen. In the middle of the table went the teakettle, plugged in and ready to boil the water. He set a few sachets of tea near it so that Killian could choose whichever she liked. He already knew which she would take, she liked strong black tea, but what if her tastes had changed?

 _If she’s just leaving work, she’ll be hungry_ , Rodion remembered. He dug through his pantry and fridge for anything he could use to prepare _zakuski_ or some sort of small dinner with, but he was out of so many things. He found a jar of brined herring which he set out then put away when he remembered Killian wasn’t a fan of herring. _Ugh…Time to go shopping_. With the increased paycheck from his extra hours, he could afford to spend a few rubles now anyway.

There was a small corner market on the lower floor of his building. A few building residents were already shopping there, likely for the little but necessary things forgotten while preparing dinner. He picked up a small loaf of bread, some sausage, and a small block of cheese. In the preserves aisle he grabbed a small jar of pickles and then some jam for the bread. According to the running total he kept in his head, he could afford to pick up a few pre-made pirozhki as well without going over budget. By the time he finished checking out and started his journey home, Killian had sent a message confirming that she was coming by.

As soon as Rodion arrived back home, he started preparing a serving board with his recent purchases. A few slices of bread here, sausage there, the cheese too. He spooned some of the jam into a small serving bowl and did the same for a small knob of butter. He remembered there was a bowl of potato salad he’d made a few days ago still in the fridge. That went on the table alongside the serving board and the jam and butter and some cutlery. He set the pickles out and put the pirozhki in the oven on the lowest setting to stay warm. There was only one thing missing…

Rodion dug through his kitchen cabinet to find a set of shot glasses. He selected only one and set it in front of Killian’s chair and then went to find the good vodka he saved for guests. It joined the rest of the food on the table. Now to wait. It wasn’t long.

He heard her familiar knock on his door, and he turned the teakettle on before going to answer the door. He invited her in and noticed the subtle shift in her expression when she saw the freshly cleaned apartment. Approval. Maybe.

“I was just putting together a small snack for dinner if you’d like to join me”, he offered. He took her coat and hung it by the door for her, then showed Killian to the kitchen, “How was your day?” He asked as they settled into their places at the table.

“Busy. Shit ton of paperwork this week. You’ve seen the news, right?” Killian asked. She poured out some water and let her tea begin to steep as they talked.

“No, what’s going on?” If something really bad had happened, he would have heard of it, right?

“The Reds have taken one of our stations on Ganymede. You didn’t hear?”

“No”, Rodion froze, how had he missed this?! He felt a flash of panic, was a war brewing? Or was it already started? He was just barely young enough to be drafted back into the Army. Why couldn’t it have happened a few months from now after his birthday? “How did it happen?”

“The Reds are claiming that they were obligated to do so. According to them, the corporation that owned it was abusing their workforce. Supposedly the workers started protesting the conditions and called in Mars to back them up. Mars sent in a team that was allegedly ‘for consulting only’ and next thing we heard was that the station’s been claimed by Mars ‘for its protection’. Seems we’re going to have no choice but to respond”.

“You think it’s going to escalate?”

“Depends on them”, Killian answered, “With the distances involved, we aren’t likely to find out anything until late in the next week. By the way, what did you ask me here for?”

Rodion sipped his tea first to calm his nerves. If he was going to ask Killian for the kind of help he needed, he couldn’t afford to confound what he wanted by stammering and hinting. He needed to be direct.

“I was wondering if you still had contacts in surveillance. I sent a few messages to the _Anna_ and I need to know if they ever got there”, Rodion asked.

Killian thought for a moment then swiped a bit of hair back, “I think I’m going to have to say no. The situation with Mars has got everyone on high alert. They’ll never approve a request to track a message right now, especially not one that’s what they’d consider ‘low priority’. And…” She paused while taking a few sips of her tea, “I know what you’re thinking of saying. If I were to go poking around ‘unofficially’ I might lose my job or worse. I can’t afford that right now”.

“So, we’re not going to get any concrete evidence that the _Anna_ _Karenina’s_ gone?” Rodion asked. He took some slices of the bread and spread some butter and jam on them. He took a bite out of one, then set it down. The bad news had killed his appetite. A shame, really, his great aunt had made the jam herself.

“Unless the corporation that owns the ship declares her missing, or she doesn’t make it to her final port, or a crewmember explicitly calls us for help we’re not going to get anything definitive through any legal avenues. Do you know where and when the _Anna’s_ due to come back in?” Killian asked as she followed Rodion’s lead, building a few slices of buterbrod with sausage and cheese. 

Rodion tried to remember, “I’m pretty sure it was Lagrange-4, sometime mid-August. Georgi’s got the date marked down on a calendar at his place, if I remember right, I’m pretty sure it was the 18th”.

“That’s only a few weeks away, I could have a friend of mine over there keep an eye out for us. If the ship doesn’t show then we can safely assume something’s happened”, Killian sighed and swiped her hair back, “I wish we could do more in the meantime”.

“I do too. If Dima’s in trouble then every day we wait and do nothing is another day he could get hurt or worse”, the sentence came out a little more plaintive than intended, as if Rodion was some sort of complaining child. He felt almost pathetic that he couldn’t think of anything else to do. Georgi was counting on him!

Killian thought for a moment, “We could look into those crewmembers I listed. We might be able to find out what their endgame is. If we can get proof that something bad is happening, we could convince the Martian authorities to bring the ship in. But we’re going to need some solid proof, they’re not going to want to listen to a bunch of Earthers spouting conspiracy theories. Especially now”.

“That sounds like a lot of work. I’m going to need some help”, Rodion said.

“As long as you’re not asking me to do anything illegal, I’ll help out where I can”, she said, “If you don’t mind seeing me more often, that is”.

Rodion smiled, despite the circumstances he couldn’t imagine anything better than getting his old friend back, “I could imagine far worse things than seeing you more often, Killian”.

He paused wondering if he’d worded the sentiment right, “What I meant was, yes, I’d like to see you more often”.

Killian laughed, “You’ve always had such a way with words”. She smiled back at him and poured out a shot of vodka then raised it in a toast, “Despite everything, I’m really glad you reached out to me again, Rodya. It should have happened sooner. To our friendship again!”

Rodion raised his tea mug in return, “To our friendship!”

They spent the rest of the evening catching each other up on the two years they’d missed. So much had happened, so much news to discuss. Killian had gotten a cat, her name was Masha, and Rodion ‘ooh-ed’ and ‘ahh-ed’ where appropriate as she showed off what had to be hundreds of photos. As they talked and laughed, Rodion couldn’t help but feel an immense joy well up when he saw her smiling and laughing. All he wanted to do was smile and laugh with her and he realized he’d felt that before. Two years ago, to be exact. This moment, it was like nothing had changed, two years hadn’t passed. It was as if this present was some sort of bad dream, a far-off rain cloud on a calm sea.

They talked and talked, sometimes talking over each other, sometimes finishing each other’s sentences. And despite his best efforts, Rodion was falling in love with her all over again. All he could do was hope he didn’t repeat his old mistakes this time around.


	16. Chapter 6 - Solaris

The place Solaris had checked into was not nearly as dive-y as where Sirius was staying, but it was on the lower-end of business hotels. Her room was even bigger than Sirius’, it had a little kitchenette and four-top dining table set in an alcove. Everything in the room was tailored to comfort over long stays, but Solaris hadn’t chosen the hotel for that reason. It was one of the few places that prided themselves on absolute customer confidentiality, no amount of money could buy their guest list. If their advertising was right, they were still committed to this even six years later. Solaris still checked in under a false name, one she had created a long time ago to stay under the radar. To the hotel she was now Emily Patel, a name that would mean nothing to anyone how somehow managed to view the guest list.

Her day had been terrible enough already, but she was not ready for what she was about to find out when she switched on the disposable terminal she’d bought on the way to the hotel. She signed into a pre-made account also tied to the Emily Patel pseudonym. She’d used it a few times in the past. She typed in her name, her real name, and prepared herself for what she might see. She needed to know what her parents believed had happened if she was going to make contact with them.

KHORANA DAUGHTER AND 6 OTHER UNIVERSITY EMPLOYEES KILLED IN CAVE COLLAPSE

That was the first article she saw, she read it looking for a mention of her by name. As ever, they only referred to her in relation to her father. She found another article and skimmed through. Again, her name hadn’t been mentioned and she was the one who had actually ‘ _died’_. She skipped to a third article, a fourth, then finally a fifth. It was in this last one that she actually read her name but they had forgotten the ‘Dr.’ that was supposed to be in front of it. She felt frustration build up.

Her whole life had been destroyed – and for what? To sate her curiosity? She’d gotten only more questions and now, to everyone that knew her, she was dead. Returning to her old life would be difficult, and the longer she waited the worse it would be but, did she really want to go back to that life? The life that relegated her to merely the daughter of someone else, not a scientist and person of her own standing, was that really a life worth living? What about the constant fear of retaliation from her father’s enemies? She didn’t even have the chance to have her own enemies – she was just a means to an end. It made her feel worthless, she was at best an object, at worst a burden. Balling her fist, she struck one of the pillows off the bed, which sailed across the room and hit the opposite wall with an unsatisfying soft oomph. If only it had the courtesy to sound right.

But maybe she could see this as an opportunity. Perhaps this was her way out. She could use this. Solaris let her mind turn over the concept, what would she need to do to pull it off right?

She needed a new identity, she could stick with the Emily Patel one for now, it hadn’t been compromised yet. But she’d need to get a new ID, maybe Sirius would know what to look for with that. At risk of stereotyping, he seemed like the type to work in those circles. She also knew someone from back in her college days…

She also needed to change how she looked - which was something she had really wanted to do for a long time, but now she wouldn’t have to face a scolding from her mother. She stood up and went to the full-length mirror on the closet, trying to think of what to do. Hair would be the easiest to change, and she had a lot of it. It hadn’t been cut since she was a teenager, only trimmed.

She had a brief flash of inspiration, went to the kitchenette and found a set of scissors. She ran her hands through her long dark hair, still slightly damp from the shower, she had been waiting a long time for this moment but she still felt a twinge of regret – she’d spent a long time growing it out. She opened the scissors and hovered over a lock that she had chosen to be the first to go. Just one snip. Her hand shook, and a small knot of fear worked in her stomach – this was the precipice, the final chance to turn tail and go home, go back to the life she knew.

She dropped the scissors.

Over the next hour and a half, she oscillated between picking up the scissors, trying to cut her hair, then dropping them. She hated her indecision and felt herself growing angrier with each cycle, until finally the blades snapped closed and a long lock of hair fell down, too slowly in the lunar gravity.

She had done it, though the cut was little higher than she’d planned. She’d wanted shoulder-length hair, but this was closer to her chin. At least it forced her to keep trimming and the more she trimmed, the more confident she felt. Finally, she had hacked a passable-looking bob. She only stopped because she kept cutting one side, then the other, and if she kept it up, she’d have to shave it all off. It wasn’t the cleanest cut, but she could find a stylist to fix the glaring errors tomorrow morning.

She debated sending Sirius a text but felt concerned that he was asleep already. She felt exhausted, emotionally and physically, and was concerned that he – too – was needing his rest. She’d wait for morning. She felt she had done enough to combat the feelings of helplessness she had felt earlier to give herself a rest, at least for a few hours. She was ‘dead’ so technically she had all the time in the world to get this all sorted.

She returned to the bed, wrapping herself in one of the blankets and wondered if she’d miss her parents and her sisters. She had never seen much of her father, there wasn’t much to miss but he’d been nice in his own way. But her mother had always pushed her away, their relationship was respectful but strained. Her youngest sister Alex had been barely a teenager last she saw her. Solaris had promised to show her around the universities, with special attention paid to her own university, of course. Alex would now be starting her first year at whichever university she’d ended up choosing without Solaris’ help.

She let herself drift into an anxious sleep, plagued by oddly real dreams that would make sense at first, then devolve into odder and odder plots. Still, a fitful sleep was better than none, and – faster than she hoped – morning came.


	17. Chapter 6 - Sirius

Sirius woke up far too early for his preference, but even then, he felt surprisingly fine. Despite the copious amounts of alcohol he had drunk the night before, he had no hangover. Its absence was discomforting – had he only dreamt about his night out?

“That was an interesting night”, Orion commented, and Sirius knew that it had in fact happened. The apparition was standing at the side of the bed, looking at him curiously, “is that what passes as fun for your species?”

Sirius shrugged, “Honestly, I was kind of disappointed, I’d hoped to get a lot drunker for what I paid, they must’ve diluted their drinks”.

“Quite possibly, but I might suggest that it’s your metabolism’s that’s changed. You’ll find that you have an increased resistance to toxins as your body heals faster”, Orion responded, then his face lit up in realization, “but…I’m guessing that intoxication _was_ your goal?”

“Yeah, something like that”, Sirius replied. He heard his terminal buzz and noticed a few messages had come in while he was out. There was one from Jaliss that had come in much earlier, and the most recent was from somebody he didn’t know. He read the one from Jaliss first.

JALISS A: Just checking in if you changed your mind already, heard you had a good night last night.

SIRIUS: How’d you hear?

JALISS A: I know the bartender at one of the bars you went to, said you nearly bought them out.

SIRIUS: Yeah, apparently, I can’t get drunk.

JALISS A: You’re a weird guy, but I can see that being useful. Anyway, are you still interested in working with me?

SIRIUS: Still thinking about it, but not yet. Have a few things to take care of here, first.

JALISS A: Don’t think too long, thinking of shipping out soon. Possible job on Deimos.

Deimos. He hadn’t been there since he shipped out on the _Anna_ which was an unthinkable long time ago. Sirius closed the conversation then navigated to his second message. It had come from somebody named Emily Patel.

EMILY P: Hi, Sirius, this is me Dr. K. We need to meet.

SIRIUS: Where?

EMILY P: Here’s my hotel address, room 23. Come by in 30 minutes.

Sirius copied the address she sent into the Maps application. It was a 15-minute trip from his location to the hotel, so he needed to get moving soon. He went into the bathroom and showered quickly, having no time to savor the experience. He briefly checked himself in the mirror, still getting used to how he looked and the new signs of having aged since he’d last really looked at himself. He left his place then navigated down the cold lunar hallways to the address Dr. Khorana had sent, which turned out to be an average-looking hotel surrounded by middle-class apartments and some commercial venues. He felt uncomfortable walking in, wondering if the well-dressed desk manager would try and stop him like often happened in the past. Still, he reached Dr. Khorana’s room unhindered.

She answered on his first knock. She had changed her hair; it was cut short – much shorter than she’d had it earlier and worn loose. It looked good on her. He wondered if he should comment on it but decided not to say anything. Dr. Khorana looked like she hadn’t slept well but she still looked a lot better than he’d last seen her. Her pallor was significantly lessened.

“How are you?”, Sirius asked as she ushered him inside. It felt like the right thing to ask.

“I could be better, want some coffee?”, Dr. Khorana offered.

Sirius nodded and she brought him a cup from the machine in the little dining area of the hotel room. It was rich and bitter like no coffee Sirius had ever drunk – this must be _real_ coffee, from real coffee beans. _How much does this cup cost?!_ Sirius felt himself slowly re-evaluating his surroundings, noticing little details and accents that caused his mental tally of the room’s value to rise sharply – how rich _was_ the doctor?

“There’s probably been a rather large economic shift” _,_ Orion suggested. He’d appeared in the chair next to Sirius and was examining the room too, “we have been ‘away’ for a while”.

 _Thanks,_ Sirius thought at him modulating his mental tone to make his sarcasm as obvious as possible, _I had forgotten._ Aloud he said, “Thanks for the coffee Doc, what did you need to see me for?”

“You can call me Solaris”, was her response.

“Like the planet, from that book? I’m guessing your dad must have read a lot of old stuff”, Sirius knew the book was already ancient when he read it. He barely remembered the plot but he remembered that weird ghosts had been a feature. Maybe he should have paid more attention to it.

Solaris laughed, “No. My dad’s never read fiction in his life, I’d wager. I’m named after my grandmother. She used to be a real adventurer; her mother was the bookworm. Have you read it? I didn’t know you were an old literature fan”.

Sirius smiled slightly, “I guess everything I’ve read is old literature by now, but no, I was introduced to the book by the film – the Russian one. My ward on Deimos was primarily Russian and Eastern European and we often got movies and books donated from people who wanted to feel like they were helping us out. Never got any new releases, always old stuff…”, Sirius laughed quietly, “It seems like I’m doomed to be behind on the times”.

Solaris smiled too, then sat across from him, also drinking coffee. She took a few sips and appeared to be thinking about something. Sirius decided to ask her again, “So, what’d you call me here for? I doubt it was for just a cup of coffee? It’s been a nice cup of coffee, though”.

Solaris shook her head, “No, I need your help with something. Read a few articles last night. Wanted to see what the fallout from that Henge business was. Apparently, the cave collapsed during the jump and now I’m officially dead and I’m trying to figure out what to do about it”.

“Welcome to the club”, Sirius responded, “What do you think you’ll do? Go back home? Do you even want to?”

Solaris sipped her coffee slowly, then tapped her fingers on the table, “No, I’m not going home. If I was, I would already be there by now. But I realized something last night”.

Sirius nodded, and waited for her to continue.

“I realized that I’ve never had any real kind of freedom in my life. Everything that I’ve done is the result of a compromise between what I want and what my family wanted. When I found out that I was ‘dead’ I felt simultaneously terrified and free. It took me most of last night to come to terms with everything, and I still don’t feel quite right about it. Still, I’ve made my decision, I’m staying ‘dead’”, Solaris stated.

“How do you plan to do that? You’ll be starting over from nothing, and what if someone wants to check your ID?” He wasn’t sure if she was being completely serious so he felt obligated to point out the holes in her plan. Disappearing completely wasn’t an easy trick. Neither was it cheap.

“A…friend… of mine knows a place where I can get my ID changed here, and I’d like for you to come with me”.

“Why do you need me?” Sirius asked.

“The most illegal thing I have ever done is sneak around some of the abandoned tunnels back home when I was a kid, am I right in thinking that you might have had more dealings with less-than-legal enterprises than I?” She asked then followed quickly, “I’m sorry if that was a bit presumptuous”.

Sirius raised his hands in placation, “It’s fine, you are right about me anyways”. He thought for a moment, trying to remember anything relevant, “Getting a new ID is usually pretty expensive, how do you plan to pay for it without blowing your cover? Your bank might notice any post-mortem withdrawals”.

“I also set aside some money several years ago, anonymously, in case of an emergency. I already withdrew some funds from it. Overall, it’s not much – but it will suffice, I think”, she explained, “We should go before I talk myself out of this”.

The two finished their coffees, then they left the room, Solaris leading Sirius to the address her ‘friend’ had sent. It was somewhere on the other side of the lunar city ‘hub’ they were in, so the walk was long. They made good time, however, as both walked briskly. They arrived at the location, a nondescript doorway in a slightly run-down neighborhood. Solaris hung back, seemingly hesitant to knock, but then she did knock, clearly, three times in a predetermined rhythm.

The door opened slowly, and a short fat man peered out, a suspicious expression on his face. “What you want?”, he barked out in heavily accented English. Sirius recognized the accent. It was similar to those that he had grown up around, and his suspicion was confirmed when a voice shouted a question from the background in Russian.

“I was told I could get an ID change here”, Solaris answered with trepidation and Sirius wondered how long it would take for the counterfeiters to take advantage of her inexperience. He started a mental timer.

“ID change? Who say you that? Hm?” the man challenged.

Solaris said a name, and Sirius could see the man’s expression change from one of suspicion to a hideous facsimile of friendliness, “Come in, come in. We help you. You have money, yes?”

Solaris nodded, “How much?”

“Ten thousands”, the man said, and Sirius marked it as less than two minutes into the interaction that they had attempted to take advantage of Solaris.

Solaris looked worried, “5 thousand?”.

The man turned to his hidden comrade and shouted to him in Russian. Sirius understood, between the expletives, that he was disappointed with Solaris’ offer. His friend answered back with a similar proliferation of expletives and the doorman nodded.

“8 thousands, no less”, he crossed his arms.

“Can you do 6 thousand?” Solaris asked, she was looking a little unsettled, Sirius guessed she was getting close to her upper spending limit.

“8…thousands”, the man responded slowly as if Solaris hadn’t understood him. Her expression became frustrated, she would play into their hands if she didn’t know better, and of course, she didn’t.

Sirius stepped in, “Hey, he’s not going to budge, let’s go to the other guys. They’ll do it cheaper”. He said this in a feigned hush, loudly enough for the doorman to hear. He hoped that Solaris would go with the story.

She looked confused, but only momentarily, “Uh…yes… the other guys. You know where they are, right?”

Sirius nodded, “Of course, let’s go”.

They left and walked away, Sirius leading Solaris in a randomly chosen direction. If he was right in his assessment of their operation, the Russians would change their mind about the price. They were just about to disappear around a corner when the doorman shouted. Solaris started, and was about to turn.

“Wait, make him come get us, it’ll knock off a few hundred or so”, he whispered to her.

The doorman caught up, “7 thousands”, he insisted.

“6 and a half”, Sirius insisted in return before Solaris could agree.

The doorman’s face crumpled, but Sirius could still see a glint of desperation in his eyes, “Fine. 6 and half. Pay now”.

After transferring the money, they found themselves in a cramped room with the Doorman, and – as it turned out – two of his friends. Sirius felt a small knot of anxiety, they were outnumbered. If this went south… He started formulating an escape plan.

Meanwhile, Solaris began to describe the scope of the task she had for them. She had come prepared, reading off details of her new identity from a list on her terminal. She’d basically planned ‘Emily Patel’s’ whole life story. Sirius was barely listening, choosing instead to focus on the two strangers, one must have been the guy who’d shouted at the doorman, and the other had been silent. Sirius could tell exactly how they’d be from how they looked – almost the exact stereotype of petty lunar-city criminals. Strong, but dumb, all talk, really. He’d been the same.


	18. Chapter 6 -  Rodion

Two months. It had been two months since that first dinner with Killian. Two months since the investigation had run into the wall of red tape. It seemed like with every passing day the situation with Mars was getting worse. First, they had taken one station under dubious circumstances, then it had been another, then another. Rodion had heard on the news that Earth was starting to increase patrols in their controlled spaces and there was this overarching sense of tension that could be felt out on the street. He tried not to look at the news too much. There was plenty else to worry about.

Killian hadn’t visited again for another two weeks. He almost thought that she’d changed her mind about rekindling their friendship. Then one day, a message from out of the blue invited him to her place to meet Masha, the cat. He’d nearly dropped his phone in his excitement at messaging her back.

The cat had really been quite cute. White and tabby with a racoon-like tail, Masha was almost more akin to a dog than a cat. Rather than avoid him as most cats were inclined to do, Masha had immediately warmed up to him, then promptly fell asleep on his lap. She was such a soft creature; finer than any furs he’d seen at the department stores. Her whistly snore had almost lulled him to sleep but then Killian had suggested getting dinner. Rodion had felt terrible nudging the sleepy cat awake so that he could leave the couch, but Killian had assured him the cat felt no ill-will for the awakening. He’d found at least a part of the process funny; the cat would grumble with each of his efforts to wake her, like some sort of annoyed teenager.

The dinner with Killian had gone well. So well, that Killian had agreed to another date for the next Friday. Now, at the end of two months, they saw each other at least once a day – if not more. But outside of that relative success, they hadn’t made any progress with uncovering where the hell Dima had disappeared to. Georgi wasn’t taking it well at all.

“It’s not like him to do this”, he’d complained one day to his brother. Rodion had come by to check in on him, something that had become a weekly affair. He felt like he needed to keep a close eye on his brother.

“Something terrible must have happened. It’s just not like him”, was the constant declamation.

“What have you told Alisa?” Rodion asked him during one of his visits.

“Uhh…It was difficult to come up with, to say the least, but I settled on telling her that his job is keeping him for a little longer because of what’s going on with Mars. She’s disappointed, naturally, and I believe she suspects something. But if she keeps asking, I don’t know what I’m going to tell her”.

Rodion had no idea what he should advise his brother to do and neither did he feel he had the right to, anyways, so he just listened and agreed when it seemed like the right thing to do. It pained him to watch his brother grieve and it was even worse watching his brother come up with new ways to lie to his daughter every time the question came up. But even then, they were making minimal progress researching the crew of the _Anna Karenina_. It made Rodion feel even more guilty. Georgi had been expecting answers, and all Rodion could give him were half-assed theories based on the most tenuous of evidence. And most of what they knew was thanks to Killian.

Despite her inability to help in tracing the messages Rodion kept sending, Killian was able to provide some useful information he wouldn’t have found with only a civilian clearance. For example, Igor Alexandrov, now welder Thomas Smith had lived a few buildings away from Rodion’s own home when he was a child.

You would never know that Smith was a planet-born earther from the contents of his track record. Everything he did seemed to be in defiance of all forms of authority, especially Earth-based ones. What had caused the man to turn his back on the planet he was born on? What had happened? What had he learned or experienced that shattered that sense of home and security that everyone associated with Earth? Was there something specifically different about that man that made him turn out to be a criminal, or was it something all men were capable of?

They had uncovered more information about their mystery man, Sirius, too. He was an Earth citizen but his place and date of birth were uncertain. Killian had found a newspaper article that she believed described a young Sirius, though he remained unnamed in the article. The contents described how a young child was found wandering around the outskirts of Nizhniy Novgorod and the utter confusion once the authorities were unable to determine where exactly he came from as his DNA did not match anyone in the system for hundreds of miles. The article stated that they were unable get anything out of the boy regarding his past and that they eventually stopped the search for his parents or next-of-kin.

There was also a photo of what had to be a very young Sirius staring confusedly into the camera. Rodion guessed him to be around 4-6 years old at the time of the photo, maybe. Rodion had the newspaper’s photo up next to the mugshot Killian had initially showed him. Despite the years between them, Rodion could still make out similar features between the subjects. They were definitely the same person. Nizhniy Novgorod was definitely where some part of that man’s story started. It must have been shortly after that article when they’d shipped him off to Deimos into the care of the Program. Effectively shutting down any chance he stood to become anything other than the man, no – kid, more accurately – in the mugshot.

The Program was a harsh system to grow up in, that was for certain. Even Dima’s best stories always had a hint of something darker and though the man would laugh, Rodion would struggle to find the objective humor in the story. Dima had rarely talked about the bad times, but when he did, they were heart-rendingly bad. Rodion could only hear so many stories about children choking down bad air, the drugs, and the violence before his own sensitivities forced him to leave the room.

Rodion knew that it was a privilege, being able to willingly avoid the ugliness of life, to be able to turn a blind eye to those parts of humanity that made him so uncomfortable. And in the Program, there was just so much of that ugliness. But even then, could you develop enough motive in a past like that to justify aiding in the disappearing of what could possibly be more than ten ships’ worth of people?

More than a thousand people had just fallen through the cracks. More than a thousand families and friends left waiting for answers. Rodion could almost feel a tangible weight on his shoulders, a weight of obligation. They had to find Dima. They had to find out the truth behind what was going on. They needed to find out more about this guy, Sirius. He had to be the key to this whole fucked-up mystery.


	19. Chapter 7 - Solaris

Emily Patel, Doctor Emily Patel – that part had cost her a bit extra – was a 24-year-old minor professor of biology at an obscure backwater university based in the belt. Sure, it was a bit of a demotion, but at least she still had _some_ academic standing, and could still apply the skills and knowledge she had worked so hard for in whatever job she’d find once she got to that point. She would have felt a lot worse about her circumstances if she had to lose all her hard work.

She felt obviously out of place in the room and she hoped that she could trust Sirius to have her back if anything went wrong. His track record hadn’t been great, but he definitely had a knack for sticking around, that’s for certain. Unfortunately, she didn’t have whatever it was that had brought him back.

“Miss, need fingerprints, on reader, yes?”, the short fat doorman told her, less a question than a statement.

Solaris stepped back a half step, “My fingerprints? Why?” If they had her fingerprints, they could easily look up who she was, and much worse, who she was related to. She’d gotten this far without it being a problem.

“Yes. Fingerprints. For to make the ID match you right”, the man gestured impatiently at the reader. His compatriot’s stances seemed more alert now, which to her relief Sirius also seemed to pick up on.

“Is that really necessary?” Solaris stalled, as she weighed her options. Best case, they might not care what her identity was, worst case – they would. Either way, if she refused them, she wouldn’t get her new ID made which would eventually force her back to her family. Which was worse?

“Okay, fine, on the reader, right?” She relented. If she acted casually enough, maybe it wouldn’t be a concern. The fat man grunted an affirmative and brought it closer to her so she could reach it better.

“Hand sit on reader 5 second, reader read, no move 5 second, yes? Otherwise we do again, and it cost you more” The doorman explained quickly.

With trepidation, Solaris placed her hand on the smooth surface of the reader, which flashed and scanned the exposed pads of her fingers. 5 seconds passed, then the scanner beeped in confirmation that it had captured her prints.

“I add prints to ID now, is last step, then ID done”, the man commented in her direction. He turned back to his computer where her new ID was being finalized and glanced at the reader’s output. Then he glanced again. _Ohhh…nooooo._ Solaris recognized the double-take. He turned back to Solaris, his eyes obviously studying her face. _He recognizes something, me? Or my name?_

“Your name. I know it somewhere…” he started. His friends closed in, each having a look at the screen. From the shift in their expressions, she knew they had recognized it too.

“It’s a common last name, I’m sure”, Solaris excused, “The computer might have made a mistake, happens all the time to me. Bad luck, you know”. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Sirius closing in as well, his hands kept carefully near his pockets while still looking relatively casual.

“No. Computer make no mistake”, one of doorman’s friends, a tall man mainly comprised of muscles and scar tissue, said, “You are one of Vitas Khorana’s daughters, you supposed to be dead”, he thought for a second, the effort of the task visually telegraphed onto his face, then said, “A lot of people would pay good money to have you back”.

She glanced at Sirius, a part of her was concerned that he’d abandon her to the counterfeiters, not that she’d blame him - they looked a rough bunch, but Sirius stepped in between them and asserted, “That’s not going to happen”.

Doorman laughed, a great hearty laugh that caught everyone by surprise, “Spacer can’t fucking count!”, he gasped out between laughs. His friends drew their weapons, a set of mean looking shivs.

Sirius had his gun out and put one of the men – the one who had first threatened them – down on the ground before the other could advance much further than a step or two. The counterfeiters looked surprised that one of their number had gone down so quickly, and Sirius used that moment to push Solaris and himself behind some cover before the doorman drew his own pistol and fired in return at them. The sound was deafening, and Solaris focused on making herself a smaller target while Sirius fired off a few return shots.

Suddenly the amount of shots fired increased by more than double.

“Fuck! There’s more of them!” she heard Sirius shout through the din, then he fell back – a bullet had caught him in the upper arm. He switched hands, using his good arm to fire off more rounds, some of which managed to catch one of the attackers, judging by the sudden yelp of pain.

“We need to get out of here!” Solaris shouted, to no one in particular. It just seemed like the thing to shout.

“Working on it”, Sirius replied between volleys of return fire, “There’s some of them between the door and us, we’re pinned!” He laughed, his laugh taking on a slightly crazed pitch which made Solaris feel a sort of primal fear of him, “At least your ID went through!”

“Yeah…that’s good…I guess”, she muttered to herself in response. She assessed the room and their cover, trying to find something that would help them get out. Another one of the attackers went down, and with a quick peek she counted only three more attackers left, one of which was still between them and the door. Of the remaining two, another went down again – the doorman, clutching his thigh as a round ripped through it. A final shot finished him off, and the smell of gunpowder and iron was permeating the air. Sirius grabbed her arm.

“Look, cover there will be better. Go when I say”, he explained, pointing at a stack of shipping crates. He shouted, “Now!” and Solaris was half dragged across the room and deposited behind the crates. Sirius swore again and stumbled as he ran, but he kept going. Sitting behind the crates, Solaris could see he had been hit again, this time in the side, and his face was tight with pain.

“Oh, no… You need a doctor”, she told him.

He feigned surprise, “Oh, you think so?” Then he turned and fired at one of the remaining fighters who went down like a lead balloon after a well-placed hit. Only one man left.

Sirius stood, mostly, the injury to his side keeping him from standing tall, and shouted across the room, “Hey, you, over there! You’re the only one left, and if you let us go you can stay that way. Otherwise, ain’t nobody gonna be left! Got it?”

“Fuck you!” was the only response he got.

“Fine, we’ll do it your way”, Sirius replied, he was a lot paler now and getting worse fast, his hands were already shaky. Solaris guessed the bullet got too close to a kidney. They needed a hospital fast. After one or two volleys of bullets flying, the final gangster fell, finished, to the ground.

Sirius fell too, Solaris just barely catching him before he hit the ground. The low lunar gravity made it easier for her to guide him out the door past the dead counterfeiters and into the main hallway leading to the rest of the colony. She deposited him on the other side of the hallway where he leaned against the exposed metal surface and she started dialing the emergency medical services.

“Wait”, Sirius requested though his breathing had become more labored and a sickly pallor had developed.

“If this is another one of your ‘no hospital’ bullshit, I don’t want to hear it”, Solaris snapped, but she still paused.

“Just trust me, I’ll be fine in a few”, he told her, and in the steadiness of his voice, she could tell he really seemed to believe it.

“Does this have to do with your whole ‘architect’ situation?” Solaris asked.

“Yeah, if you want to find out more, don’t put me in a hospital. Please? If I go to a hospital, I’ll definitely end up being a lab rat again. I don’t want that. Not again”, he pleaded.

Solaris swore, all her instincts were telling her to call a hospital and get him medical care, but Sirius seemed utterly convinced that letting him die was the better option, and he _did_ come back last time.

She put her terminal away then offered him her hand, “Look, whatever happens, it probably shouldn’t happen here. Your place is closest, try to hold out until we get there, okay?”

Sirius nodded and let her help him up. Solaris guided them through the halls, then finally to the dive-y hotel Sirius was staying at. The desk manager looked unbothered by the sight of the two covered in blood, saying only where to find the first aid kit included in the rooms and that they could expect a rather expensive cleaning charge on checkout, then he went back to his business.

Sirius keyed them into his room where she deposited him in the bathtub. He was looking better already; the paleness had subsided and he was looking steadier.

“Wait, how are you improving so fast?” Solaris asked while she grabbed his injured arm. Gently pulling back the sleeve she saw that the bullet wound had gotten smaller – he was healing fast.

“I don’t know _how_ it’s happening but I noticed it when my leg was hit earlier. Even while running, it was starting to feel better. Made no fucking sense but that’s what happened”, he explained, “Look”, he lifted his shirt to show the wound in his side, “It’s getting better”. He looked relieved. Solaris wasn’t sure exactly, but it _did_ look better than last she saw it.

“How does it feel?” Solaris asked, now that Sirius wasn’t dying her curiosity was greater than her fear.

Sirius grimaced a little, “It still hurts, but it also… _itches_ …like a bitch and I feel…really fucking tired”. He leaned back and before Solaris could comment, he passed out. The suddenness scared her. It was like a switch had flipped. Solaris checked his pulse; it was regular and strong and his breathing was within normal ranges so she let herself relax – he wasn’t about to die.

She theorized that the healing process, however it worked, required lots of energy. If it was tiring him out like it did, the energy must be taken from his body and directed into healing, supercharging his natural regenerative rate. But how would that work? What was directing it? How efficient was the process? What were the limits? This wasn’t her area of expertise, but she knew a few people from her days at the university who might be able to help. Getting into contact might be tough, she should start working on that sooner rather than later. Next to her, Sirius started to stir.


	20. Chapter 7 - Sirius

When Sirius woke up, he found himself in a bathtub, covered in blood. Not his ideal way to wake up, but there were some mornings where he’d found himself in worse places than this. Solaris sat nearby; her gaze unfixed but her nose was crumpled in concentration.

“Blyaddd…” was all he could manage to say as he started coming back to himself. That was enough to catch Solaris’ attention again and she looked at him with an odd expression that was somewhere between fear and curiosity.

“Are you…alright?” She asked and sat next to the tub.

“I’m not dead”, he realized he hadn’t seen if she’d gotten hurt in the firefight and hadn’t thought to check afterwards, “What about you? Are you alright?” Sirius asked.

“Not hurt, luckily, but holy shit you have a lot to explain. Like, first, how-”, Solaris started, then Sirius cut her off. There was no telling how many questions she was about to ask, best not to let her start just yet.

“Look, why don’t we talk after I get cleaned up? I’m covered in blood right now and that’s not really my idea of comfort”, he explained.

“Oh, yeah, you’re right”, Solaris got up to leave, taking the medical kit with her. Just as she was about to step out, she paused, “Where are your clean clothes? I can leave them right outside the door for you”.

Sirius told her where she could find them and she finally left. Alone in the tub he sat, thinking. He hadn’t died this time, only healed. _Is there a limit to this??_ Sirius asked directing the question at his new mental roommate, who had been oddly silent.

 _I don’t believe it will be a problem_ , Orion answered, and Sirius telegraphed his frustration to the alien who then answered, _Think of it this way, as long as you don’t go throwing yourself into a sun, I can work with whatever’s left._

 _That answer doesn’t really inspire confidence,_ Sirius replied.

 _You asked a question, I gave you an answer_ , was all that Orion had to say.

Sirius frowned, then started to strip off the bloodied clothes he was wearing. _Hopefully this washes out, I don’t have the money to keep buying clothes for every little thing_ , he thought. Then he showered quickly, pausing at where his wounds used to be. In their places were some pale scars but he could swear they were fading as he watched. He pressed on the area the wound on his arm was, anticipating some sort of pain, but instead it felt normal except for a slight inflamed heat at the healing site.

After his shower he cracked open the bathroom door to find the clothes Solaris had promised waiting right outside. He changed and ran a comb through his hair – it was long enough to actually need it now – then stepped out to find Solaris, lost in thought, sitting at the little table and chairs that was in a corner of the room. When she saw him, her face lit up. Time for the questions.

“I want to know _everything_ about how you coming back from the dead, the healing, your so-called Architect, and the Henge fit together. And I’m not going anywhere until I get an explanation”. Her expression was resolute, and Sirius stopped almost involuntarily in response, then chose to sit on the bed, the furthest place from her.

“You’re one hell of a scientist, huh?” Sirius asked, he had expected the mild-mannered doctor to have started to panic by now after all she had been through. He was starting to feel panicked himself as he considered everything that had happened to him, “We’ve been in at least three firefights, you’re legally dead, and people tried to kill or capture you twice since we met, and you still want to ask questions and figure our whatever puzzle you’re working on, which – I suppose is a good thing for your profession – but I never agreed to be your puzzle and it’s making me kinda uncomfortable. Don’t you think you should be a little more concerned about _your life_ instead of mine?”

Solaris looked taken aback for a moment, as if she hadn’t yet realized she should feel more concerned for herself.

“Don’t get me wrong, these last few days have been terrible and I’ve been avoiding coming to terms with it since we got here, and part of me blames you for ruining my life” Solaris started then caught herself, “Sorry, I don’t mean that to be rude”.

“Ruining lives used to be my job”, Sirius replied, hoping she’d take the joke. At the very least, she smiled.

“But, you’re right, I’m insatiably curious and I have a tendency to be a bit obsessive when working on a problem, so, I’m sorry if I’m coming off as a bit intense. It’s just, you happen to be right in the middle of the biggest mystery in the universe, and I’d be an absolutely terrible scientist if I didn’t want to find out more, but – I guess – you _do_ need your space, and I hardly even know you, I just got carried away”, Solaris’ face was slightly red and her posture had become much smaller, she was embarrassed, “I’m sorry, you’re right. I need to back off”.

“I don’t understand where you’re coming from at all, but I can tell you’re telling the truth, so, thanks”, Sirius replied, then he remembered their less-than-friendly meeting, “For whatever it’s worth, I wouldn’t have shot you”.

“What?”, she asked.

“You know, when I held you hostage? You can’t have forgotten already”, Sirius said, “If it really came down to it, I wouldn’t have shot you. At least, not lethally, might’ve gone for an arm or something”.

Solaris looked incredulous, “Uh…thanks? I guess?”

Sirius just nodded in reply, then lay down on the bed thinking about what he would do next. He could sign onto another ship and resume in a way the life he had before, or he could take up Orion’s suggestions. That would mean he’d need a ship of his own, and a crew to run it with a pay rate that would guarantee their loyalty, and he barely had enough money to pay another week at the hotel. How would he get the money? No one would loan to a guy that had been dead for 80 years.

Across the table from where Solaris sat, the figure of Orion appeared. Sirius nearly jumped at the sudden appearance but kept his surprise under control.

 _What do you want?!_ Sirius glared at what had to look like an empty seat.

“You know what you need, and you know what she wants. Is making a deal really that hard for you?” Orion asked him, gesturing at the oblivious scientist, “I don’t mind offering some of my knowledge to sate the scientist’s curiosity if it gets us some help or even a ship. It’s your decision unless you _enjoy_ having me around”.

Sirius sighed in defeat, then turned to face Solaris, “Hey, you got any way to buy a ship?”

“A ship, what for? I guess it really depends what kind”, Solaris answered, “why are you asking? Do you need a one?”

“Yeah, if I’m going to check out what Orion wants me to check on, I’ll need a ship of my own”.

“Who is Orion?”, that focused expression had returned: Solaris’ interest was piqued.

“He’s the architect and if you can get me a ship, he – I mean – we will agree to helping you answer your questions, does that sound fair?” Sirius asked her. Unseen by Solaris, Orion smiled and nodded then disappeared; the alien seemed quite happy to have gotten his way.

“Of course, I’ll start looking at the listings”, Solaris responded almost immediately, then she smiled, “I’ll try not to overwhelm you with questions on day one, it’s better anyways that I draft up a plan and organize my thoughts before we get into it”.

“Makes sense, thanks for helping me – us – out”, Sirius replied. His stomach rumbled and he felt that strange sudden tiredness wash over him again. So much so that he rolled over onto his back and closed his eyes. His stomach grumbled again, loud enough that Solaris heard it.

“Hey, maybe we should get some food before you go back to sleep again, might give you some more energy to work with”, Solaris offered, “I know a place that serves _real_ fish, they raise them in tanks here on the moon. I’ve heard the sushi they make from it is almost like the real stuff from Earth”.

“That sounds…expensive”, Sirius commented, he could count on one hand the number of times he had food that wasn’t designed to sit on a shelf for more than a year.

“It’s really not”, Solaris commented. Sirius looked confused, and she explained further, “Not anymore. Some scientists back home figured out the best way to raise fish in low gravity shortly after the war. Almost every colony has a few tanks now. I’m guessing real fish must have cost a fortune back in your day”.

Sirius had never had sushi before but he understood that it was some combination of fish and rice and one of the two was uncooked. He wasn’t sure how either of those would pan out, and he’d been lying down just long enough that getting up would take more effort than he was willing to exert. “I’ll just grab something later”, he told her. She nodded in response. He waited to hear the door close and lock before he let himself give in to his exhaustion.


	21. Chapter 7 - Jaliss

_**That Evening…** _

She had just settled down for a drink at a small bar called _The_ _Leaky Ice-Hauler_ when she got that familiar feeling. The feeling of being watched. She hunched over and let her eyes scan the space until she found the source of the feeling. _Fuck. It’s him._

Her watcher approached, a greasy-looking man in a suit, his fingers covered in rings. He looked anxious and the way he rubbed his hands together reminded her of a rat. A messenger for The Greek. She could almost smell the fear coming off him. When he sat nearby, Jaliss noticed he’d kept out of her arm’s reach. Not that it’d matter. If she wanted him dead, all the space in the world wasn’t going to keep him safe. He placed a small black briefcase on his lap and clutched it like it would otherwise walk off if he didn’t hold it tight.

“Good evening, Miss Alexander, Boss want to see you”, the Messenger avoided her gaze as she stared him down.

“It’s Jaliss. Just Jaliss. I keep telling you fucks to leave it with the ‘Miss Alexander’ shit”.

The Messenger shrank in response but took a small envelope out of his briefcase and slid it over, “The job. It’s all in there. Boss wants to see you in half an hour at the _Loca_. Be there”. Then as suddenly as he’d appeared, he was gone.

Jaliss opened the envelope to find a few sheafs of handwritten notes detailing the finer points of the job. With how connected every piece of tech had become, the most secure way to share incriminating information was to keep it from ever hitting the servers. Also, paper recycled especially well, breaking down into its component molecules and chemicals with little effort. Reconstructing that soup of recycled materials would be impossible. For modern organized crime rings, going old school was the most logical conclusion. She skimmed through the notes. Pretty standard elimination job, so what the fuck did the Greek want?

She ordered another drink. She couldn’t remember what it was called but it was the cheapest thing on the menu. Glancing out the windows to the public concourse, she watched people pass by while she worked on her drink. Then she saw a few of the local bruisers coalesce into a small party which then headed towards the _Hauler_. Whatever they were up to here, Jaliss didn’t want to get caught up in it.

Jaliss got up and left. The bartender could close out her tab on her account. She made her way to another bar, the “Scottish”-themed _McGowan’s_ _Pub_. The music there was a bit loud for her tastes, but the crowd could help draw attention away from her. She ordered another Bottom-of-the-Menu Special and started to savor it. The one offered here was some mixture of reconstituted juice and bottom-shelf liquor. She only got halfway through the drink before she saw the station security roll up in front of the bar she’d just vacated. What had gone on in there? No point staying around long enough to find out. She closed out her tab and then left the pub.

The next nearest place was called _Titan_ and it occupied a laughably small space. An open kitchen like theirs only worked if you couldn’t see the chef actively and happily picking his nose. She could go to the _Luna Loca_ early. It was probably best to get the Greek’s business out of the way sooner rather than later.

At the _Luna Loca_ all she needed to do was wave at the bartender for her drink order to be delivered to the lounge, then she made her way past the bouncer. They nodded at each other in mutual appreciation of their respective skills. She’d worked with him once, he was efficient. In the largest booth of the lounge sat her boss for this job, The Greek.

He was a large, fat man. Dressed impeccably, covered in precious metals, and surrounded by his lieutenants, The Greek drew the attention of everyone in the room. Until Jaliss walked in. She could feel the stares of everyone burning into her skin. It wasn’t every day that a 2-meter-plus tall woman walked into a bar. _That could be the start of some kind of joke…_

She chose a booth off to the side. The Greek would send one of his men to her whenever he was ready for an audience. All she needed to do was wait. She had just received her drink when she saw one of the Lieutenants approaching her table. This one looked like a taller and skinner version of the Greek, like he’d been pulled by a candy machine.

“The Greek will see you at his table now”.

She nodded and waved him off. She took a moment to finish her drink before she got up and approached The Greek’s table. It appeared he was mid-dinner. The table was loaded with large plates of Greek food catered from a local restaurant. The fat man smiled when he saw her.

“Jaliss! Nice to see you, please, join me”, he waved her to a spot beside him. She saw his bodyguard cast a sidelong glance at his boss, but The Greek was undeterred. Jaliss understood his reasoning. It was a show of power, like having a bear or tiger dance for his amusement. There was also the very convincing consequence of mutually assured destruction should she ever dare to turn on him. Even if she killed the man, Jaliss and everyone else in the room knew that she would never make it out the door alive. It made for some painfully polite meetings.

“Have you eaten yet?” The Greek asked in the same tone a concerned aunt would use, “Please, take what you’d like. Waiter! A new plate!”

The plate materialized as if the man had willed it into existence. Jaliss wasn’t particularly hungry but she took small amounts of food anyways. It wouldn’t be a good look to refuse him. Indulging his generosity now might encourage him to be more generous later, especially in terms of payment. They sat in silence for a few minutes, and as anxious as she was to know the reason for their meeting, she wasn’t going to turn the conversation to business just yet. The Greek had asked her here, she was on his time. He would get to it whenever he felt like it.

“So, you must be wondering why I called you here, yes?” He asked while patting his round face clean with a napkin.

“I was starting to wonder, yes”, she replied after swallowing a mouthful of lamb souvlaki. _Damn this food is good_. There was a dish of baklava that she was definitely going to take advantage of later.

“I asked you here because I heard you’ve been doing some independent work. You remember my stance on independent work while you’re on my contract. I’d like to think you have a good explanation for what you did down the street from here”, his expression was friendly, but she knew it was all a front. _Time to choose my words carefully…_

“I, uh, ran into an old friend who needed some help. We got tangled up in the BSM matter by accident. But they were on your list anyway, I just hit them early. Subtract the damages from my contract”, she told him. She kept her expression calm and her tone light, like they were discussing the weather and not justifying the murder of seven men.

The Greek looked unimpressed, and Jaliss felt concerned that he hadn’t bought it, then smiled. “You, my friend, are lucky. If you were anyone else…” He never needed to spell his threats out, Jaliss knew exactly what he was capable of.

“Thanks for being understanding about the matter, I’m glad we could work this out”, she responded. She felt a previously unnoticed tension in her shoulders relax when the big man nodded graciously. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw movement. One of the waiters approached and signaled for the Greek’s attention.

“Sir, there’s a disturbance at the door”.

The Greek’s benign expression focused into something halfway between annoyance and anger, “What do you mean disturbance? Can’t you see I’m busy here? Take care of it!”

“There’s a woman at the door, says she has a friend in here and she won’t leave”.

Jaliss froze, nearly dropping her dolma. Sirius’ friend wasn’t that stupid, was she? “Did she give a name? What does she look like?”

The waiter turned to her, surprised that she had dared involve herself in the matter and he took a second to answer. “She’s, uh, short, kind of heavy. Short dark hair, Martian-Indian descent from her accent, I believe”.

_Shit. It’s her._

The Greek looked at her expectantly, “Do you know this woman?” He asked, _Is it your fault she’s here?_

“No”, she lied, “but I was about to leave soon, anyways, I can take care of it for you”.

The Greek shrugged, “I believe that you’ll take care of this…disturbance and I’ll greatly appreciate it if you keep it clean. Before you go, take some of that baklava with you. You’ve been eyeing it like you’re going to fuck it for the last ten minutes”.

Jaliss laughed, the man was surprisingly perceptive. She wrapped up a generous piece of the dessert into a napkin and went to confront her pursuer.

The woman was waiting for her immediately outside the entrance of the VIP Lounge.

“What are you doing here?” Jaliss demanded.

“I need your help”, she asked, “Sirius has been arrested”.


	22. Chapter 8 - Sirius

Red. All he could see was a fractured red, broken only by the jagged shards of the Orbital satellite as they fell slowly downward like a rain of twisted metal.

He was on his back, an unfamiliar weight pressing him down into the red dirt. His helmet was covered in cracks, he could hear the hiss of air escaping and a blinking red light somewhere in the edge of his vison told him that the oxygen was running low. His lungs burned from the rapidly thinning air. There was something in his throat that caught with every breath, it tasted of iron.

 _Just keep breathing_ , he willed himself to stay awake long enough to do what needed to be done, _just keep breathing, it’s gonna be over soon_.

He could hear the crunch of heavy Martian boots approach, but it would be too late by the time they got to him. He’d make sure of it. They’d all made sure of it.

His numb fingers searched for the button on his suit’s leg that would dispense the poison. He could find it in his sleep, they had trained so often so there would be no hesitation. He pressed it and waited. And waited. _Why wasn’t it working?!_

He felt the flash of panic even through the numbing adrenaline. He pressed the button again, and again, nothing happened. He rolled over as much as he could to see what was going wrong and was hit by a wave of paralyzing fear as he realized what had happened.

His arm was gone. Just below his elbow there was nothing. It…made no sense. He’d felt the arm there just a second ago. His heartbeat raced in his ears as he realized there would be no easy way out. His stomach cramped painfully and he threw up into his helmet, the smell making him gag and cough. His lungs burned even more as he inhaled some of it. Fuck, so _this_ was how he was gonna go out. Choking on his own fucking vomit, _Fine. Least I won’t spend the rest of my life in a Martian prison_ , he thought.

As he coughed and struggled a shadow fell over his helmet, a hulking figure obscuring the sun. Power armor painted in swatches of red and grey, a Martian Marine. Next thing he saw was the barrel of their gun in his face and he froze as the figure morphed into that of the man who’d shot him first. He found himself standing now, no longer choking on thin air and vomit, as he stared into his killer’s eyes. They were solid black.

He felt himself break out into a cold sweat as he stared down the barrel. He could see the man’s fingers curl around the trigger, each second lasting a lifetime. All he could do was watch as the muzzle flashed and there was a resounding bang. 

Sirius bolted upright with a gasp. He was still in the hotel room on Luna; Mars safely millions of kilometers away. It was just a dream but he still felt the cold sweat clinging to his skin and the nausea from earlier hadn’t gone anywhere. In fact, his stomach churned aggressively enough to send him running to the bathroom where he vomited into the sink.

Clink, something fell into the sink as he heaved and coughed. When the nausea had faded enough, Sirius turned the tap on to rinse everything down. Something metal had fallen into the sink, and when he rinsed it off, he recognized it, even as warped as it was by impact. It was a bullet. He stared at it, which one was it? The one that had caught him in the side, or the one that had caught him in the chest? It made his blood run cold to look at it, but he couldn’t bring himself to throw it away. Instead, he tucked it into a pocket, he’d throw it away later.

He left the bathroom and picked up the comm that had fallen one the floor. Now that he knew how to use the maps application, he looked for the closest dive bar that he hadn’t been to yet. He wanted someplace the bartender wouldn’t try to cut him off. His stomach growled again, and Sirius remembered he was hungry. Drinking the day’s calories was just fine by him, the alcohol would hit harder on an empty stomach anyways. Vodka had a lot of calories anyways, right?

It didn’t take him long to arrive at a bar called The Leaky Ice-Hauler. It looked to be a dockworker’s hangout, with most of the patrons sharing the same Spacewalker too tall and too skinny frame that Sirius had. For a brief moment, he could convince himself he was back home in his own time but the illusion would shatter when he looked too closely at things, there were just too many tiny details that were different now.

Sirius went up to the bar, “Vodka, full bottle, cheapest shit you got”.

The bartender nodded, “How many glasses?”

“Just the one”.

If the bartender was surprised or disapproving, he did a good job of not showing it. He disappeared into the back of the bar and returned with a bottle of Ganymedian Vodka that Sirius could already tell would end in a hell of a hangover. There was something all-too-familiar about the labelling on the bottle, some conditioned barely-conscious response to its appearance that reminded him of the many times he’d drunk himself violently ill. It was perfect. He paid the man and retreated to a dark corner where he could watch the room without having to worry about being watched himself.

The first sip was the worst. The liquor was offensively potent and it burned from the moment it touched his lips. After the first wave came a drying bitterness that Sirius recognized. Whatever was in the liquor stills on Ganymede hadn’t been washed out yet. Despite the obvious health and safety implications, it was still somewhat comforting to taste something so familiar.

Orion appeared and sat across the table from him. It was still weird getting used to actually seeing him. The alien looked puzzled. “Why do you choose to drink this stuff?” Orion asked, “It’s not exactly doing you any favors.”

Sirius tried to think of an answer, then shrugged _, I don’t know. All I know is that it gives me an excuse not to deal with things for a while_.

“And that’s a good idea?” Orion continued. There was a note of judgement in his voice.

 _Is there an alternative_? Sirius asked back. He knocked back a half-glass in one go, then finished the remaining half as soon as he’d recovered from the burn. Sirius kept this pace up, hoping that eventually he’d be too drunk to have to listen to Orion. The apparition frowned, then disappeared.

After Sirius had drunk the bottle down to a little over half, he was feeling pretty properly buzzed. He wasn’t as far gone as he should be for the amount of alcohol he’d just drank, but he was making good progress on getting there. So, there was a way to overwhelm this new metabolism. Sirius could order a second bottle and drink that one slowly to maintain his high, or he could go for broke and put that one down just as fast as he was doing the first one.

There was something vaguely appealing about not being responsible for the next few hours. Whatever the fallout would be when Sirius would eventually sober up, it didn’t seem too intimidating now that he was this far into his drink. However bad it was, it wasn’t like he was going to die, right?

Jaliss walked into the bar. At least, he thought it was her. It was getting hard to focus his eyes right but he could recognize her height. There couldn’t be that many tall-Earther-looking types on the moon. From what he could see she looked irritated like the last time he saw her, but maybe that was just the way her face was. She sat at the bar and looked around, but she didn’t seem to notice him. Sirius wondered if he ought to greet her, or even join her at the bar, but then she shifted her posture in a way he hadn’t seen from her before. She looked defensive. Sirius scanned the room to see what Jaliss was reacting to: some greasy lawyer-looking type with a briefcase who was fidgeting too much.

The lawyer-type and Jaliss talked for a bit, during which an envelope changed hands. Sirius decided it was probably a good idea to mind his own business. Jaliss didn’t seem the type to appreciate him involving himself in her work all of a sudden. Especially not while he was wasted.

He was finishing off the bottle when he saw Jaliss react to something again, but instead of looking defensive, she looked more aggressive. Whatever she saw, she wasn’t having it. Sirius checked the room again, but whatever or whoever it was wasn’t in the bar just yet and before it arrived, Jaliss left. He wondered if he ought to follow her lead, but then he’d have to turn in his bottle before he left. He’d paid for the whole damn thing; he was going to drink the whole damn thing.

Sirius had just poured out the last glass when he felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. He slid further back into the corner and carefully swept the vodka bottle under the table before looking for the source of his anxiety. There. Four men. They’d look like ordinary dockworkers if it wasn’t for the matching face tats they all sported. The shape was vaguely familiar. One of the counterfeiters had worn one. These had to be his friends.

He wasn’t the only one that noticed them, the rest of the bar’s patrons clocked them too and, one by one, they all started leaving. Sirius took the bottle he’d hidden and held it like a club under the table, watching as the four men scanned the room. Had they gotten a picture of his face? He couldn’t remember if he’d seen any cameras near or in the counterfeiters’ den, they could have gotten a very good picture of him at any point of the transaction. So could the cops, if they’d bothered to come by. How could he have been so stupid?

The men spread out, each taking a corner of the bar to search. The remaining patrons cowered in their seats as each member of the quartet took out their Comms and compared the seated targets with an image on the screen. So, there was a picture. Those patrons that passed inspection were directed to leave and slowly, the bar emptied. As Sirius debated when to leave, he noticed two more tattooed gangsters walk in and post themselves at the only exit. He was trapped. All he could do was buy as much time as possible. Or…he could just get it over with now.

He took the drinking glass, threw back its contents, and threw it at the nearest gangster. Thanks to the low gravity, and his inebriation, it arced over the man’s head and shattered against the opposite wall. All eyes turned to his corner of the room and his heart rate kicked up a notch. There was a tightness in his chest and he suddenly flashed back to when he got shot. The blinding flash, and the resounding bang, then the smell of the gunpowder, he could feel himself falling, then there was a sharp pain in his side. Then suddenly he was on the floor of the Ice Hauler, surrounded by the four gangsters. Off to the side, he could see Orion had reappeared with a concerned look on his not-real face.

 _How did I get here?!_ Sirius asked Orion.

“You overloaded somehow. As soon as you remembered the shooting it was like a thousand alarms going off all at once and it was like you mentally…stopped…for a bit”.

_A bit? How long was I down?_

“They grabbed you halfway through the…event. You’ve been down at least three minutes by my count”.

 _Fuck. Any way you can hel_ -, Another kick snapped him out of the conversation and the mental image of the alien dissolved.

“How the fuck did this skinny-ass Spacer take out six of our guys if he can’t keep it together for five fuckin’ minutes?!”, one of the gangsters asked.

One of his friends just shrugged, “Knew an addict who could get like that. When he was on the shit he was ice cold, but as soon as he got low he’d turn into a fucking mess, just like this one”. He went for another kick but Sirius was ready for it. He dodged and tried to pull himself up only to be grabbed by the other two gangsters who shoved him to his knees.

“Not so fast, my friend, we’ve got some business to take care of first”, the first one said.

Sirius smiled in response, “Business ain’t gonna take care of itself, why are we wasting time?”

He was able to dodge the first couple of punches, but eventually one connected and the world flashed white. A barrage of punches followed; the only respite he got was when the gangsters swapped turns to attack.

“Not so tough now, huh, Spacer?” he heard one of them growl at him.

A lot of the initial shots were to the face, but after the first few rounds, they started focusing on softer targets like his stomach. One particularly well-placed shot left him retching and coughing as his stomach contents forced their way out. The gangsters all cried out in various tones of disgust, and dropped him while he heaved. Sirius could smell the cheap vodka and the sour smell of stomach acid. Everything was tinged red, which meant that he was probably already bleeding internally. He coughed and spat out the last of the bile.

“Is that…is that all you got?” Sirius challenged. He got a kick in the ribs as a response but as soon as he recovered from it, he sprang to his feet. The effort was excruciating but he went for the nearest gangster and wound up for a punch. His target batted it aside, and pushed him back. Sirius stumbled and fell against the bar. The gangster he had tried to hit drew nearer and Sirius started looking for things he could use to push him back.

Glass bottles glistened in the light and Sirius grabbed the nearest one and smashed it over his attacker’s head with as much force as he could manage. The man’s face exploded into a mass of blood, bone, and skin. A near-inhuman wail escaped the shredded mouth and Sirius kicked him back to the floor. He grabbed another bottle as the injured man’s friends advanced with murder in their eyes. Sirius was smart enough to know that he was unlikely to beat all three of them but at least he could give them a rough go of it. Suddenly, the doors burst open and a line of men in riot gear filed into the room.

“Time to fucking go! It’s the cops!” Someone shouted. But it was too late, within minutes everyone in the room was disarmed and shoved against some portion of wall with their hands zip-tied behind them. The two police that had grabbed Sirius turned him back around so he was facing them, and one lifted his visor.

“You are being placed under arrest by Lunar Security Commission. Do not resist. If you resist, you may be subject to additional charges. Do you understand?”

Sirius stared at the two of them, trying to determine if they were the good kind of cops or the bad kind. After a tense minute of silence, the cop who had spoken shook him, “I said: Do. You. Understand. Nod or say yes, or we’ll add resisting arrest to your charges”.

So, they were the bad kind. Sirius laughed nervously, “Nyet Angliiskii”.

The cop looked irritated, “Agh, fuck, another damn Russkii, we’ll have to get Semyon to talk to this one. Get him to the station!”


	23. Chapter 8 - Solaris

**_A few hours earlier…_ **

Solaris was up to her ears in virtual paperwork and the massive blocks of Martian, Lunar, and Jovian legal code regarding the registration and purchase of small, independently-operated, long-haul capable ship that wouldn’t cost too much. She’d had upper-level genetics textbooks that were less textually-dense than the block of 20-something statutes and sub-statutes that regulated every aspect of legal ship ownership and operation.

She spent a few hours reviewing all the materials, getting familiar with the intricacies of the three major legal systems. Luckily, when it came to ship-related regulations all three systems were relatively uniform in their requirements. Solaris wasn’t clear on how the politics worked out, but suspected it was likely the result of intentional partnerships between the three systems as a way to expedite the identification process. The only real odd ones out were the Lunar regulations but they were still heavily based on the old Earth systems.

There was a knock on her door, so she got up and answered it. There was no one there, but on a side table in the hall was a plastic to-go box from the restaurant she’d ordered from when she’d gotten back to her hotel room. The food was still piping hot and the steam from it carried the familiar scent of a local restaurant’s version of Palak Paneer. It was a comforting aroma that reminded her of the conclusion of many sleepless all-nighters when simply ordering takeout was more convenient than cooking breakfast. 

Solaris started eating her food and for a little while she started to feel better, like the last 72 hours she’d experienced had somehow been a strange dream. She wished it was just a strange dream, because then she’d wake up in the old humid hab down on Earth where her only concerns were collecting and collating the data from the samples in the caves. But no, strange and uncomfortable as it was, this was her reality and she needed to face it as her mother often said “with grace”.

She let herself settle into a semi-meditative state now that she’d had some relative peace for once. Solaris had never held with the notions of spirituality behind meditation, but she’d had a therapist once show her some interesting studies on its efficacy as a form of therapy. As far as she was concerned, it had been more helpful than harmful. Solaris turned her focus to the last few days. Observe their events as if watching a reel of film. No judgements, just watching.

She remembered finding Sirius in the Henge for the first time. The surprise, the questions, her immediate desire to help and how that all turned sour when Murphy had shot him. Solaris remembered how she returned to work, how the events had distracted her, how Murphy’s violent first response had unsettled her. Why did that man always assume that new meant dangerous? That next morning had felt a little better, at least, until Murphy had asked her to do the paperwork. It had bothered her, not just because Murphy was bothersome, but because it would’ve been a few days before any Martian Police would arrive after the initial report, so why was he so keen on getting it done now?

Solaris took a deep breath and re-centered herself, she was slipping out of objectivity. After the paperwork she’d tried to sneak in and get answers from Sirius. Afterall, she’d thought he’d knw a few things about the Henge. She had felt disappointed that he didn’t but realized the hunt for answers seemed almost more tantalizing. That is… if there _were_ any answers to be found. That seemed equally likely. Then, in the cell, Sirius had seemed relatively harmless at first, until…

Somehow, he’d been able to get that cell door open. She’d been so scared. Terrified really. It had been a long time since she’d felt that kind of fear. And then Murphy came in and made things worse. Why was violence always the first response? And Sirius, he’d kept her guessing up until they’d popped up on the moon. He’d been equal parts threatening, reassuring, and completely honest with her. It had been a confusing sequence of events, the whole thing. But even then, when it counted, he’d stood up for her. But was Sirius _really_ a good guy?

No.

Solaris remembered how Sirius and the tall woman had killed all those Blue Sky gang members without a second thought. How they’d looted from them, joked over it. Good people didn’t do that. Good people wouldn’t even _think_ of doing that. Could Solaris afford to spend so much time in the company of people like them? How could she morally justify not condemning them? And the fact that she hadn’t spoken against any of the bad things they’d done, did that make her complicit? Solaris had already broken the law by buying a false identity, how slippery was the slope from normalcy to utter lawlessness? Was this where it started?

She let the question churn about in her head but from every angle she looked at it, it still placed her squarely in the wrong. If there was some sort of universal karma, she’d have to balance it with something really damn good to offset these new negatives. After all, people had gotten hurt because of her. Granted, she wouldn’t be here if those people hadn’t gotten hurt but was that a justifiable trade? Their lives for hers? Ethically speaking, that was a difficult question but objectively, people were dead. Solaris knew that eventually, she’d start to feel guilt, once she’d processed all her other emotions.

A gentle ping broke her focus. Her Comm had been set to remind her to go to the gym. In the much lower lunar gravity, it was important to put in a little extra work in maintaining her physique otherwise she’d lose it fast. Solaris wasn’t necessarily the most fitness-obsessed, but on the off chance she had to go back home to Mars, or return to Earth, she’d find transitioning a lot easier if she put in the work now. She gathered her things and then headed to the nearest gym.

Solaris rounded the corner and stopped short as she saw the tall woman who’d helped them earlier leave a bar called _The Leaky Ice-Hauler_ and head down a row of dive bars into another. Just as Solaris was about to move on, she felt a jolt of panic. Also approaching the _Ice-Hauler_ was a group of men walking purposefully to the bar. She’d recognized something about them, they reminded her of the men who’d shot Sirius. She stopped again and decided to try out Sirius’s tactic of somehow blending into walls. How did he do it? Was it a matter of posture, something she could mimic? Or was it some sort of innate quality?

She saw people leaving the _Ice-Hauler_ , at first one-by-one, then in larger and larger groups. The only people going towards the place were more of those gangster types. Something was about to go down, and whatever it was, Solaris felt way to close to it. She heard crashing and glass breaking inside, then a security cart screeched to a halt in front of the place. The gangsters outside scattered while a line of armored security disappeared into the place faster than she could count. Solaris was just about to leave and try another place when she saw him.

The security were bringing out their detainees when she saw that Sirius was one of them. His face looked bruised and she noticed he was bleeding from one of his hands. What had happened in there? Some kind of fight, but who had started it? The rational part of her kept telling her to stay away from it, but the researcher part of her was not happy that her only source of information had just been arrested.

Solaris searched her phone for the nearest security station. At a kilometer and a half away, it was a bit of a walk. They had an electric cart, by the time she got to the station, they’d already have booked Sirius. What would happen when they tried to run an ID check on him? If his real identity showed up somehow, they’d probably think he was using a fake. He’d be facing 5 to 10 just on that alone if she remembered the big scary signs in the arrivals section of the lunar docks. Even more once they’d connected the other dead gangsters to him. Solaris would never be able to find out more about the Architect if her only good source was behind bars. If she’d only just kept her old identity, she could probably convince the station police to let Sirius walk on last name alone. Failing that, a small “donation” might have helped, but now she had neither the power of name nor a particularly deep well of funds to draw from. So, what could she do?

She paced the hall trying to work out some sort of plan when she saw her. The tall Earther woman. She was walking into a place called the _Luna Loca_. She could help, for as much obvious disdain she showed Solaris, she and Sirius seemed to have gotten on alright. Solaris decided to follow her. Whatever happened next, at least she had tried.


	24. Chapter 8 - Rodion

Nizhny Novgorod. The city at the confluence of rivers. Fed by the waters of the great Volga and Oka; it was –even in the dark of early morning- a sight to behold. Close to the river, the old parts of the city seemed virtually untouched by the years, but as soon as you turned away from the river, the effect ended. Massive apartment blocks towered over the old city and it seemed like there was a crane just behind every rooftop. In the distance, Rodion could see the massive scaffolding of the megastructure-like Nizhegorodian Kosmodrom, the Yuri Gagarin National Cosmodrome. Even from the river-side, one could feel and hear the low rumble caused by the massive rockets taking off and landing.

Rodion had taken an overnight train, the now-ancient Strizh, with the cheapest fare possible, but he didn’t have to endure the hours of discomfort from the economy-class seats alone. Killian had agreed to come with him on this excursion.

“I could use a weekend wild goose chase”, she’d joked when Rodion had brought up the idea of spending the weekend digging further into the news article. It seemed a straightforward enough task, visit the newspaper that ran the article and ask to speak to the editor. With any luck, that would turn over the first stone of many.

Rodion had insisted that their first stop was at the Kremlin, from the gardens there one could see the confluence quite well. Across the waters, the first bright sliver of sun was peeking over the horizon. It brought the old city into sharp relief, creating pools of light and shadow over everything. That, and the glitter of light across the water made for a spectacular sight. Perhaps this, this sight had been the one to make the first ancient warrior that stood on the banks decide, “yes, this is the place for our home”.

“Hey, hudozhnik, you ready to get to work?” Killian asked.

Rodion smiled at her, “Why can’t we just enjoy the moment?”

“Because we said we’d meet the editor at ten and it’s already 8:30 and we haven’t even checked into our place yet”, Killian reminded.

Rodion took her hand, “We have time for 5 more minutes. For me, please?”

“Fine, you old romantic. But that means we won’t have time for breakfast”.

“Means we have a better lunch budget”.

Killian leaned her head on his shoulder, “Can anything dampen your spirits?”

Rodion shrugged, “Perhaps. Nice view, though, hard to understand why anyone would leave all this to live in a cold tin can”.

“Sometimes it’s not just about choice, Rodya”.

Rodion took a half step back and the moment was ended, “They’re not going to send you up there, right?”

“If they say I have to go, I have to go. It’s my job. You know this, you can’t build a career on ground jobs alone. Everyone higher-up has gone to space, and if I want to be one of them, I will too, eventually. This was never about ‘if’ it was about ‘when’”.

“Have they told you when? Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

“I thought you knew. I mean, I’m hardly the first of our class to go up, in fact, I’m one of the last”, Killian swiped a piece of hair from her face, “I was nearly scheduled to leave that first week we met again, but I chose to stay. You needed help, and then… I… Well, I couldn’t leave without making things right with you”.

“But…” Rodion tried to collect his thoughts into at least one coherent protest but found himself staring with his mouth open. The words just wouldn’t come.

“Look, Rodya, there’s no point in worrying right now. Let’s just enjoy this weekend. If it makes you feel better, I’ll go with you to the art museum later. But, if you take forever reading every single plaque in every single room, I _will_ die of boredom on the spot”.

Rodion nodded, still feeling deflated from the prospect of Killian’s departure. She took his hand again, and gave it a reassuring squeeze, “It’s time to go, we’re already running late”.

The Nizhegorodian Times was situated in an ancient industrial sector of the city. The weathered brick building was surrounded on all sides by massive warehouses. The streets were bustling with a plethora of service vehicles and overhead was the constant buzz of delivery drones zipping from place to place. These, and the roar of the rockets made for an ever-present assault of sound in a way that was both audible and physical. He could feel the noise in his chest.

Luckily, as soon as they stepped into the building and the doors had shut, the noise was dampened. Rodion only realized he’d clenched his jaw in response to the noise when he felt himself relax in the relative silence. Killian had already reached the secretary’s desk and was presumably ensuring their meeting with the editor was still on the books.

Rodion spent the time glancing around the ancient building, noting that aside from Killian, the secretary, and himself, there was no one else. It was utterly silent here.

“Hey, Rodya, the editor’s ready to see us. Let’s go”, Killian took his arm. The two were led by the secretary to an office on the 3rd floor of the narrow building. Most of the offices they passed appeared empty, lacking furniture or filled with stacks of boxes that hadn’t been opened in a while. Those that had occupants were inhabited by men old enough to be Rodion’s father, or even older.

The compared to the relatively tiny offices of the lower levels the editor’s office was palatial. Well, it would be if all the clutter had been cleared out. Rodion could spot bookshelves lining the walls, though their contents were obscured by piles of boxes and old furniture. On one side of the room a stack of decommissioned monitors were piled quite dangerously high.

The editor, one Konstantin Korolyev, rose from his desk as he saw his visitors.

“Welcome to our humble little undertaking. I understand you had some questions about an article we published, uhh, 20 years ago? Please, sit down, can I offer you two some coffee?”

The secretary took their coffee order and disappeared. Killian drank hers with a splash of milk, no sugar, whereas Rodion asked for “too much sugar and a hit of milk”. He wasn’t particularly fond of coffee.

Now that they were alone, Korolyev tapped a few things on his keyboard, “I’m afraid it’s been quite a while since I looked at the file we had on that article, just bringing it up so I can better answer your questions. But, I’m just curious, what’s your interest in the article, do you perhaps know some of the boy’s family? Or is this something else?”

Rodion looked at Killian, who stared back, obviously not intending to do the speaking for him.

“No, we’re not here about his family, we just wanted to know more about where he was found, who found him, and if there was anything else you could remember from that day”, Rodion explained.

Korolyev nodded thoughtfully, “Those are some very specific questions, do you mind if I take a minute to read my notes?”

They sat in silence as the man read, during which the coffee was delivered. Killian took barely a minute to finish her coffee, while Rodion sipped at his slowly.

“Ah, yes, here we go. Right, so they found him just across the river in a small town called Oktyabirskiy. Some lady found him and brought him in. The locals weren’t sure what to do when they got him, apparently, he wasn’t speaking Russian. They got the authorities involved, and there’s the history”.

“Could you tell us more about the lady that found him?” Rodion asked.

“No, not really, she only gave us her initials: A. A. Karenina” Korolyev said.

“A. A. Karenina? Like, Anna Arkadyevna Karenina? That can’t be her real name… Did you get anything else from her?”

Korolyev turned back to his computer, his eyes scanning the monitor intently. “Hmmmm…it appears we got a copy of the police report. It has a phone number listed, not sure who might be on the other end of it by now. You could give it a shot; she might be able to answer your questions more thoroughly”. Korolyev wrote the number down on a yellowed square of paper, “Good luck getting your answers. And…you know, if there’s some sort of story to this whole thing, remember how we helped you, eh?”

Downstairs, Rodion took his phone out and began tapping the number in.

“Are you sure this is going to work?” Killian asked.

“No, but it’s the only lead we have”, Rodion told her as he tapped ‘call’.

The line rang for a while, long enough that Rodion began to fear the number was dead until there was a beep and a woman’s voice responded.

“Da? Who is this?”

Rodion nearly dropped the phone in surprise, “Uhh, excuse me, but is there an A. A. Karenina I could talk to?”

“Yes, there is”.

“Can I talk to her? It’s about something that happened around 20 years ago, I have some questions”.

“You are talking to her! I am Anna Arkadyevna Karenina, may I ask who’s speaking?”


	25. Olympia, Mars

In the dawn light, the Martian capitol city of Olympia rose impressively over the valley. Tall skyscrapers covered in glass and greenery reached upwards into the sun with organic grace. On one of the terraced buildings stood the president of the Martian United Planetary Congress, Vitas Khorana. It was a ritual of his, to watch the city go about its business before he started with the meetings and readings for the day. A little quiet moment, to visualize his dreams for the future before diving right into the concerns of the now.

Hundreds of years of labor had gone into turning the red planet into one that narrowly mirrored the source of Humanity. There were things that weren’t quite perfect, but still, in comparison to the alternatives this was paradise. Free air, free water, a low-but-tolerable gravity, safety from radiation, the list of things to be thankful to the brave first colonists for went on and on. That reminded him, the planning meeting for the Landing Day parade was coming up. Vitas wondered if perhaps there might be some kind of speech he could make out of this.

The sliding glass doors behind him slid open with a hiss. Vitas turned to see that his father, Karthik, had arrived for their morning coffee together. The two men couldn’t look more different. Where Vitas chose to wear a sharp but otherwise understated suit, his father was dressed more ostentatiously in traditional cloths embroidered finely. And where Vitas’ hair was only just beginning to start going white in places, his father’s hair was completely white.

“Morning father”, Vitas greeted cheerily.

“Have you read the news today?” Karthik asked. He was always a business first sort of man.

“No, I have not. Why don’t you sum it up for me while I get the coffee going?” Vitas asked as he busied himself with the coffee machine.

“Thought it might interest you to know that the shareholders really enjoyed that speech you gave at the charity dinner last week. We’ve gone up a few points on the market already and I think that merger that was on the table with M-K will definitely come through”, Karthik explained.

“Oh. That is good news…I guess. I’m just quite happy that we met our fundraising goals so quickly, that kind of money is going to help so many Martians achieve their dreams”. Vitas had been very proud of his campaign to make higher education more affordable for lower-income families. He’d started it in his daughter’s name as a way of honoring her memory. He hoped that it would make her proud, wherever she was.

“Excuse me, Mr. President, but you have a visitor”, one of the aides interrupted.

“Tell them to sign on for an appointment”, Karthik interjected before Vitas could respond.

“I’m sorry, but I’m afraid it’s urgent. It’s Mr. Hofmann from Security Services, he’s said it’s regarding the family security” the aide clarified.

“Give us a moment to clean up our coffee, then send him in, thank you”, Vitas replied.

The aide disappeared quickly. Vitas stood and started clearing away the mugs and accoutrements. His father grabbed his sleeve as he turned away.

“You shouldn’t let people just come and interrupt you like this, it’s unbecoming”, his father commented.

“It’s my job”, Vitas explained as he stacked everything neatly on a tray to return to the kitchen. He made it a point to take care of the majority of his housekeeping if he could, “As the president I’m accountable to the people. Most especially if they’re from the Security Services”.

Karthik stood, “Would you like me to leave then?”

“Is your security clearance still valid?”

Karthik thought for a moment, “Still got a few years before it expires”.

“Well, then I think it’s fine. Might as well concern you seeing as it’s about family”, Vitas sat at his desk and motioned for his father to seat himself in a nearby armchair. There was a sharp knock at the door.

“Come in!” Vitas called. The door opened and Hoffman, a grim man with a Security Services badge, walked in.

“Mr. President”, he greeted Vitas. Then he noticed Vitas’ father and nearly paused, “And Mr. President”.

“Mr. Hofmann, good to see you…I hope”, Vitas requested and gestured at the chair in front of him. The Security Services man nodded and took his place across from Vitas. He looked questioningly in the direction of the older Khorana.

“It’s quite alright, I’m told it concerns the family security anyways”, Vitas explained, “If it’s quite alright with you, we can speak with him in the room”.

Hofmann nodded, “It’s quite alright then. Let me send you the files and I’ll walk you through them”, he took his comm out and tapped a few things on the screen. Vitas and Karthik’s comms both pinged as the report was received. Vitas opened it to see a few image and video files listed. He glanced back at Hofmann and nodded.

Hofmann took a deep breath and launched into his explanation, “Right, so you know that we are required to report any and all instances of you or your family’s names being used in conjunction with a list of target words that could indicate potential dangers. Standard security measure, you know. We found some concerning traffic regarding one of your daughters, Solaris”.

“Solaris?” Vitas asked as he felt his chest tighten at the name. Sure, she had been gone six years already, but it was still painful to remember the loss. She’d been such a bright girl, so much potential.

Hofmann nodded, “We recently picked up on a message sent from Armstrong City to Apollo Base on Luna, that indicated they had captured a woman they believed to be your daughter. We knew that they were mistaken, but they attached a video to the message which was what initially caught our attention. Look at the first video”.

Vitas opened the first video file to see the camera focused on a single woman in the middle of a bare room. She was pacing frantically and looking around. He paused it on one of the frames where her face was most clear. Her face stood out immediately. She looked almost exactly like his late daughter.

“We believe her to be some sort of impersonator. When we ran her credentials all we pulled up was what looks to be a fake identity under the name of Emily Patel. We took the initiative to track her movements given the obvious security concerns and that’s where things took a turn for the-“ Hofmann paused, obviously lost for wording, “well, quite frankly the weird”.

“What do you mean ‘weird’?” Vitas asked, wondering how it could possibly get weirder than someone trying to impersonate his dead daughter.

“We were able to track down the origination point for the video. Lunar security found the place to be completely empty. It looked like a professional clean-up job. The impersonator did show up on local cameras just outside the location though, with what we believe to be her associates: the woman and man in the second file”, Hofmann paused to let the two switch to the right file.

In the image, Vitas could see the impersonator sitting on a bench. The angle wasn’t good, but from her demeanor she looked stressed. Next to her stood a large woman and a very tall and thin man. They appeared to be talking about something.

“Who are they?” Vitas asked.

“We identified the woman to be Jaliss Alexander, 26, from Earth. She’s on one of our watchlists, raised in one of the Blue Sky extremist factions. We think she’s been working as hired muscle on Luna for a few months now under the employ of a man the locals call The Greek”.

“And what about the man?”

“He’s been giving our ID system some trouble. We’re still working on identifying him. He’s where things get…weird, as I said earlier”.

“Really? How so?”

“When we were going through older security footage to trace their movements on Luna, we noticed an odd”, Hofmann paused again, “discrepancy. The earliest video feed we have that shows this man and the impersonator has them walking through the level 3 concourse on the east side of Armstrong city where they come into conflict with some of the local flavor. It goes quite poorly for the two, in fact we see him get shot right on camera timestamped to _before_ we see the trio together after the first video, look”.

Vitas played the video. Thankfully, the quality was grainy enough that he didn’t have to see the man get killed in full definition, but what was there was certainly enough to remove the question of the man’s survival. He returned to the photo of the three conspirators. The man was there, alive, like he hadn’t been shot at all. But how could this be?

“That’s definitely weird, but maybe the timestamps are incorrect? Or there’s a twin we don’t know about”, Vitas tried to reason.

“That was our theory, but if we follow how the gangs typically dispose of evidence, it makes sense that they’d send him to one of the recyclers. We flicked on the cameras to the nearest recyclers and find that, yes, that was their plan. After that clip I showed you, they put the body on a cart. 30 minutes after the shooting you can see two of the gang members rolling the same cart that appears to be carrying a body to recycler 3. The camera view is limited, but look at the next video. This is 10 minutes after they enter the restricted zone”, Hofmann clarified.

Vitas played the video. In it, a woman that looked like the third conspirator walked down the hallway leading up and entered the restricted area. The video then cut to 6 minutes later, showing both the woman and the supposedly dead man leaving the room. The man was dressed exactly the same way the dead man was, and even the dark patches on his clothes that must’ve been blood had barely changed.

“We ran the images captured by the cameras though a comparison program, the computer is absolutely _convinced_ that the man who was shot and the man who is walking out of recycler 3 are the same person”, Hofmann said, “We ran the images against multiple comparison programs, they _all_ agree”.

“But what does this even mean?” Vitas asked, none of this made sense, “If this is the same man…”

“Does it mean the terrorists have access to some advanced healing protocol that we are unaware of?” Karthik interjected before Vitas could find the right words for the same question.

Vitas nodded, “As far as I remember, none of ours can work that fast, and certainly not after total brain death”, he added.

“It’s certainly a question we’ve been considering”, Hofmann answered, “That kind of healing power in the hands of those Blue Sky zealots could cause us considerable trouble if it gave them enough confidence to engage us directly”.

“Just imagine what that kind of healing power could do for warfare, or medicine”, Karthik mused, “We _have_ to find out what it is they’re using! We should apprehend them, see what it is they’re keeping secret!”

“We are currently keeping an eye out for these three but they’ve dropped off the radar so to speak”, Hofmann replied. He turned to Vitas, “Do you have any specific instructions?”

Vitas considered it for a moment, “Keep watching for them to pop back up again. As soon as they do, we should watch and wait until it becomes safe to apprehend them”, he flicked back to the initial video of the impersonator and looked at it thoughtfully. She really _did_ look like Solaris. Almost painfully similar. He could’ve been fooled if she was still alive, and he felt himself grow angry at the thought.

“Once we’ve got her, I would very much like to speak to my daughter’s impersonator”, he requested.

Hofmann shot him a questioning glance, “Are you sure that’s a wise idea, sir?”

“Yes”, Vitas answered, “I want to understand why she is doing this to us. There’s nothing she can gain from impersonating the dead, no one will buy her act. It’s has to be motivated from a place of pure spite, a way of forcing us to relive the worst day of our lives!” He hadn’t meant to raise his voice, but the anger just wouldn’t quiet. He paused, trying to collect himself, Hofmann didn’t deserve to be shouted at.

When he finally collected himself enough to speak more calmly, Vitas said, “I want to speak with her, because I want her to know that she has messed with the wrong family”.


End file.
